Choosing Between Making Money and Doing What You Love

 

I read an article recently in the Harvard Business Review that posed the question:

“If you’re really passionate about what you do, but it’s not going to make you a lot of money, should you still do it?”

What a great question! Of course, telling someone to do what they love, and the money will follow is certainly inspiring, but is it true? Couldn’t you do what you truly care about and very well go broke?

Absolutely. I have a friend who left his high-powered corporate career to pursue his passion, and three years later he is broke and looking for work again. But that doesn’t mean he regrets his decisions or that you shouldn’t go after your dream…

Research shows that when we do something we love, or at least work towards doing something we love, we become more creative, more resourceful, and more persistent – which of course helps us get further faster. Not to mention, people who make progress every day toward something they care about (even if it’s just for fifteen minutes a day) report feeling far more satisfied and fulfilled. So doing what you love is not only uplifting, but hugely productive too.

But, let’s be real. None of this guarantees wealth, or even financial security.

And so we are back to the question: “If I have a passion that I’m pretty certain is not going to be super profitable, should I still go ahead?”

Of course you should. Here’s why:

1) Money Does Not Guarantee Happiness

More than ever, we are defined by how much we earn. But does a higher salary make us more content? No. More and more research is confirming that there is, in fact, little correlation between happiness and income. Work by the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman indicates that a higher wage delivers little in terms of personal wellbeing – and even suggests that, above a certain point, earning more can actually cause a decrease in contentment levels. That is not to say making no money is good either – as Kahneman notes, ”Money does not buy you experiential happiness, but a lack of money will probably buy you misery.” The point is “Making more money is, in itself, an empty enterprise.”

The truth is there is far more to our happiness than money. Personally I think it has much more to do with our relationships (with God and with others) than it has to do with what’s written on our paychecks.

2) Great Stories Are Told With Risk and Sacrifice

I was chatting to a friend of mine Sean Temple, who left his corporate job to pursue his passion of starting and running a functional training centre called Flux. Now most people who look at Sean would say he is “living the dream”, which he is –  Flux is successful and growing. But I know it hasn’t all been plain sailing. Whenever you try something new, you’re always going to face a lot of obstacles. Most people who leave their job to earn more and work less, usually end up working more and earning less (at least in the beginning). But here’s the deal –  if you had to ask Sean if it has all been worth it – I know his answer would be “Absolutely yes!”

You see, security and comfort are overrated. What matters more to us is purpose and passion.

3) It Just Might Work!

Something you might not be considering when choosing between making money and doing what you love, is that it just might work! You might, indeed, end up making money if you engage in your passion, even though you currently think you won’t. Remember, the future is unknown. Who knows what people will want or buy in the future. After all, who knew you could make huge amounts of money figuring out a way to connect all your friends (Facebook)? At any moment in time, you are only one thought away from an insight — an insight that can change everything.

So, don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive. 

Footnote: If you are seriously considering leaving your job and pursuing your passion full-time, I highly recommend reading Jon Acuff’s book Quitter: Closing the Gap Between Your Day Job and Your Dream Job

4 Things You Can Never Recover

1. The Stone After the Throw

Oh, how much easier it is to see the faults in others than it is to see our own faults! How quick we are to attack someone else or to pass judgment on them. And yet these stones we hurl at others can never be retrieved. Jesus knew this. He says to us, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” (John 8:7).

2. The Word After It’s Said

“Handle them carefully, for words have more power than atom bombs“ -Pearl Strachan. The words we speak are powerful things. Words can tear down or they can build up. They can bring death or they can bring life. But once they have left our lips, they are like leaves scattered to the wind – they can never be taken back. So before you lash out with harsh words, take a moment to press pause and measure what you say with grace and mercy.

3. The Oppourtunity After It’s Missed

“I held a moment in my hand, brilliant as a star, fragile as a flower, a tiny sliver of one hour.  I dropped it carelessly, Ah!  I didn’t know, I held opportunity.” - Hazel Lee. Oppourtunities in life aren’t always easy to recognize. We usually expect them to come with beepers and billboards, but most often they are dressed in overalls and look like work.  Sometimes we call oppourtunities problems and we try to avoid them, but the truth is nothing is so often irretrievably missed as a daily oppourtunity.

4. The Time After It’s Gone

Life is short. I have never been more aware of this until now. Watching my ten-month old son grow up in front of my eyes so quickly has reminded me that life goes not backward nor waits for any man. And so make the most of the time you have been given, and “don’t be fooled by the calendar – there are only as many days in the year as you make use of” – Charles Richards.

Are Search Engines Ruining Our Lives?

This is a guest post by Maurilio Amorim that I found quite interesting food for thought…

Google and search engines are ruining our lives. I’m convinced of it. Sure, we can now find everything we want to know about any given subject by typing a word and hitting search. Now wait. We don’t even have to finish typing the word. Magical internet search engine elves anticipate our search criteria and fill in the rest of word or phrase for us, most of the time with eerily accuracy.

What’s so wrong about that? Well, the instant retrieval of exactly the information we search for is convenient for sure, but it is doing away with a part of my past I wish I could still have: serendipitous discovery.

I remember looking through the card catalog and pouring through stacks of books in my college library in search of a book and finding authors and titles that were not even on my radar, but due to the “analog” nature of my search, our paths crossed and the title I was not looking for ended up changing my life. Those opportunities are rare in the efficient world of the search engine.

The digital assumption is that we know exactly what we want and all we need is help finding it. But do we really?

How will we ever discover a better alternative to our limited assumption if we take away the wonder of the unexpected? How will we ever meet the more interesting, exotic and surprisingly fun girl if the only dates we are matched with are based on our Barbie-like profile preference? Darn search engine meta-tags. You are the nemesis of serendipity.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that knowledge is no longer a differentiator. These days a head full of facts is a waste of brain power. Who needs to memorize trivia when you can access the world’s knowledge in your cell phone in 30 seconds or less? But I miss the random encounters with facts, writing, music, and people that my old analog world forced  me to experience.  It was in those moments that I ran across an obscure Shakespearean sonnet, that I discovered the music of Basha, that I met the woman who would become my wife.

Now I can find exactly what I want. But is that what I really need?

Are You Addicted to the Internet?

Source: Coupons.org

Back to the Future: 7 Ways to Use Your Past to Guide the Present

Last week I posted about advice we get from our “future selves” – our elders. Today I want to look at the reverse: advice we get from our past selves…

Have you ever found an old journal and been amazed at what you were thinking and feeling? Or have you ever wished that you could go back to that day when you were feeling super passionate and excited about life and bottle that enthusiasm? Well, now you can!

I have just finished reading Jon Acuff’s awesome book Quitter (side note: If you are trying to balance the tension between your day job and your dream job, this is the book for you!) Anyway, in the book, Jon refers to a website called FutureMe.org which really captured my imagination.

The idea behind the website is so elegantly simple that it is easy to miss its brilliance…

FutureMe.org lets you send emails (to yourself) at a specified date up to thirty years in the future. You simply put in your email address, type an email, and then decide what date in the future you want it delivered to your in-box. It even lets you edit the address of future FutureMe.org emails, should you ever change accounts.

Why is this such a powerful tool?

Well, because we all have passions and dreams and hopes for the future. Unfortunately, life has a funny way of knocking those hopes right out of you, and every now and then it’s good to remind ourselves of those dreams.

Receiving a letter from your past self can be a powerful exercise in refocusing your attention on the things that matter most, reminding yourself of the passion and intensity you once felt for those things, and giving you that much-needed encouragement to carry on.

Here are just a few ways you can use FutureMe.org to live a more intentional life:

1. After you attend a conference or seminar, write an email to yourself six months down the road to remind yourself how you felt, and of the key takeaways and action points.

2. Think about the seasons ahead during the year that you typically experience lulls in enthusiasm or periods of high stress. On a day when you are feeling great, send yourself a series of emails to encourage yourself in those times.

3. Write the classic “Where I see myself in five years” email, and have it delivered to you in five years time. I’ve heard it said that we generally overestimate what we can do in a year, and underestimate what we can accomplish in five.

4. Write an email to yourself about enjoying the true meaning of Christmas and set it to be delivered at a time when things tend to become most crazy during the holidays.

5. Send an email to yourself on those “anniversary” days in your life to remind yourself how lucky and fortunate you are.

6. Send yourself emails about more practical matters (birthdays, anniversaries, car services, doctor check-ups etc.).

7. Use it as a general memory pool (the contrast of what you now think about your current situation and what you will remember about it in a few years can be stark)

Real generosity toward the future consists of giving all to what is present. FutureMe.org may just help you use your past to live more fully in the present.

QUESTION: What other uses can you brainstorm for FutureMe.org?

 

Thanks to Jason Fountain for his inspiration.

6 Tips From Your Future Self

In an episode of one of my favourite TV sitcoms “30 Rock”, CEO Jack Donaghy has a hallucinatory encounter with his future self, from whom he receives life advice that helps him avoid major mistakes.

Pretty cool.

I’m sure most of us would also like to know which choices and decisions we make today that will benefit us later on – or come back to haunt us. Of course there’s no way to step into our own futures, but we can get a very good sense of what mistakes we should avoid in life by speaking to those who have “done life” before us – our elders.

Based on this premise, Karl Pillemer, a professor of human development at Cornell University, has over the past six years conducted several studies involving 1,200 older Americans regarding the advice they would offer to members of the younger generation.

The surveys addressed questions like “What mistakes should younger people avoid?” and “What are people most likely to regret when they get to the end of life?” And so, according to America’s elders, here are the top six  biggest mistakes young people make as published by CNN:

1. Putting too high a priority on money.

2. Getting into debt.

3. Worrying too much.

4. Excessive drinking and drugs.

5. Rushing into marriage before you’re ready.

6. Passing up opportunities.

I’d love to hear your own thoughts on  this advice. Do you think it’s spot-on, or misguided? What advice would you add to this list?

Why Consistency is So Important

On Sunday night I had a sick feeling in my stomach.

For the first time since I started my blog in December 2010 I did not have a post scheduled to go out on monday morning. The last few weeks had run away with me, and I simply hadn’t disciplined myself to sit down and write something.

I had nothing.

But then I remembered something that made me smile:

When I made the decision to start this blog, I committed myself to writing at least one post a week. At the time I wasn’t at all convinced I would stick to it, but now looking back, I realise I have! And what’s more, I realised that because my posts are usually between four hundred and six hundred words, and this is my ninetieth post to date, I have in fact written about fifty thousand words for this blog – the equivalent of a two hundred page book!

Now, if you’d told me a year ago that I would be able to write a book in my “spare time”, on top of work, studies, family, and everything else, I would have laughed at you. And that’s when it hit me:

Success is not a single act, but rather a daily habit. Whether you want to write a book, get fit, or lose weight, the key is consistency.

So here are 10 random thoughts I had about consistency:

1. Consistency creates momentum.
2. Consistency is a habit that can be practiced and learnt.
3. Consistency breeds credibility.
4. The person who takes action every single day toward the attainment of their goal will always triumph over those who do it every once in a while. Always.
5. Many think consistency is purely a matter of willpower, and that people who are consistent have some kind of special ability to endure. Not true.
6. Surprisingly, doing something every day or nearly every day is actually far easier to sustain than doing it once in awhile.
7. Motivation is not enough. A person waiting for inspiration limits achievement to times when conditions are desirable. And conditions are rarely always desirable. 
8. Creating healthy rituals will take you further than desires and passions.
9. Consistency will induce failure at some stage, which in turn provides valuable feedback, which ultimately leads to better results.
10. Consistency is more about sustainability than it is about speed.

What are your thoughts on consistency? What has helped you to become more consistent?

The Power of Pressing Pause

I am an impulsive person.

When I know I want something, I go after it. Sometimes foolishly. Just ask my wife.

So I’m trying to learn the power of pressing pause. Of taking a step back and reflecting in the midst of a world that continues to move in fast-forward.

So often we act on urges without really thinking, and without even realising it. And it gets us into trouble. We have the urge to eat junk food, and so we do it. We have the urge to skip a workout, and so we stay on the couch. We have an urge to smoke, to criticize, to check Facebook, to gossip, to open our inbox…  and we act on that urge. But, as Leo Babuta writes:

What if instead we learned to pause after each urge? What if we stopped, looked at that urge, paid close attention to what it feels like inside our bodies, but didn’t act? The urge would no longer control us. We would be able to make conscious choices that might be healthier for us...

And that’s why the pause is so critical.

Because when we pause, we create space. Space for life. Space to breathe, to think, and to respond proactively .

Such a small thing, and yet so powerful.

Of course, learning to press pause in our world and in our culture is no easy feat, but it can be learnt and practiced and improved.

In the Bible, the psalmists use a very interesting Hebrew word “selah“ which, while its definition is not entirely clear, means something like “pause and calmly think about that“. It’s like after every statement of praise or nugget of truth, the writer is trying to get us to stop and think and take it all in, instead of simply jumping to the next line or chorus…

or email,

or conversation,

or TV program…

Imagine if we could live our lives like that? Stopping and reflecting. Taking it all in. Acknowledging the urge, but not acting on it. Practicing the power of the pause.

The urges won’t go away, of course, but our ability to pause will get stronger. And when you have the pause, you have life!

7 Ways To Feed Your Brain

When it comes to maintaining physical health, we all know how important a balanced diet is. However, we seem to be less clear about what we need to maintain a healthy mind.

Dr. David Rock, executive director of the NeuroLeadership Institute and author of Your Brain at Work, believes we are living in a “time when too many people’s mental well-being is being stretched through multi-tasking, fragmented attention and information overload,” and asserts that we are now facing “an epidemic of overwhelm.”

In response to this epidemic, Dr. Rock, in collaboration with Dr. Daniel Siegel, has created what he calls the Healthy Mind Platter. This platter offers seven essential mental activities that are necessary for optimum mental health, and provides the full set of ‘mental nutrition’ that your brain needs to function at its best. Here they are:

Focus Time

When we closely focus on tasks in a goal-oriented way, taking on challenges that make deep connections in the brain.

Play Time

When we allow ourselves to be spontaneous or creative, playfully enjoying novel experiences, which helps make new connections in the brain.

Connecting Time

When we connect with other people, ideally in person, richly activating the brain’s social circuitry.

Physical Time

When we move our bodies, aerobically if possible, which strengthens the brain in many ways.

Time In

When we quietly reflect internally, focusing on sensations, images, feelings and thoughts, helping to better integrate the brain.

Down Time

When we are non-focused, without any specific goal, and let our mind wander or simply relax, which helps our brain recharge.

Sleep Time

When we give the brain the rest it needs to consolidate learning and recover from the experiences of the day.

Of course it’s all about balance.

Just like it wouldn’t be healthy to eat only carbohydrates, so too you shouldn’t just live on Focus Time without much Sleep Time. The point is to understand the full spectrum of essential mental activities, and then try to provide as many oppourtunities for your brain to develop in different ways.

When I first came across the Healthy Mind Platter I was deeply challenged to find more balance in what I was putting into my mind.

How do YOU feel about what you’re feeding your brain?

What Are You Practicing?

If only I still looked like that!

I was gymnast for many years growing up.

And in gymnastics, like many other sports, when you are training to learn a new skill, you can’t just simply get up and do it. First you must break down the skill into components – simpler, smaller movements we called “drills”.

Each day we would consciously practice those specific movements in a very deliberate way, and we would repeat those movements over and over again – sometimes thousands of times. But eventually, through sheer repetition, we would become good at those movements. And once you had mastered the various “drills”, you could link them together and be able to pull off the skill.

I think our entire lives are a bit like that…

Each day we repeat movements – thought patterns, ways of interacting with others. And in this repeated practice, we are becoming (or have already become) good at these things.

And so if you constantly swear or use bad language, that is a practice, and you are forming that habit. When you gossip, or speak rudely to others, or lose your temper, this is something you are practicing to be good at.

You may already be good at these things. I know I am.

And so of course the big question is, WHAT ARE YOU PRACTICING?

Because we might have all the good intentions to be or look a certain way, or to end up in a certain place, but the harsh reality is that we become good at what we repeatedly do.

In other words, we become the sum of our daily habits.

And so, what if, instead of practicing the bad stuff that holds us back, we consciously and intentionally started to practice the things we really want to be good at? Things like self-control, patience, kindness, peace, forgiveness…

Then, as we link those “movements” together, we will be able to pull off the greatest skill of all: To live well.

 

This post was inspired by an article I read at Zen Habits.

“No” is the New “Yes”

Too many people I speak to tell me they spend their long days responding to emails, putting out fires, and running around in a constant state or urgency.

Sound familiar? You are not alone.

It’s a problem many of us struggle with – a vicious cycle we cannot seem to solve or free ourselves from. We react to what’s in front of us, whether it truly matters or not.

More than ever, we’re prisoners of the urgent.

We know that setting goals and prioritising help tremendously, but the problem is that prioritizing requires reflection, and reflection takes time. Most of  are so busy racing just to keep up, we don’t believe we have the time to stop and think about much of anything. It is a myth we live by now.

And so too often we default to saying “yes” to everything and everyone. It’s just easier that way. We can avoid conflict, and it takes less time than pausing to decide whether or not the request is truly important. Some believe there’s also an adrenaline rush in saying “yes”. As Tony Swartz writes,

“Many of us have become addicted, unwittingly, to the speed of our lives — the adrenalin high of constant busyness. We mistake activity for productivity, more for better, and we ask ourselves ‘What’s next?’ far more often than we do ‘Why this?’”

But as Gandhi put it, “A ‘no’ uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a ‘yes’ merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble.”

So what does saying “no” actually look like? Well, I think it means:

• Taking time out to reflect and prioritise
• Deciding what to do less of, or to stop doing altogether
• Regularly stepping back from the madding crowd
• Sometimes disappointing people
• Fighting the urge to respond to the latest urgent demand or seductive source of instant gratification

Of course, these things are hard to do, and it requires greater discipline and effort on our part. BUT… when we learn to thoughtfully say “no”, we give ourselves the space to reflect on, metabolize, assess, and make sense of what we’ve just experienced, so that we might live proactively, rather than reactively.

And so… in a world of relentless demands and infinite loops, saying “no” just might be the most undervalued skill of our times.

21 Steps to Awesomeness

As I was checking out my blog stats the other day I realised that many of my most popular posts all have something in common: NUMBERS. Check it out:

• 16 Tips to Simply Your Life (And Increase Your Productivity)
• 6 Things To Stop Caring About Today
• 4 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Do Kettlebells

And I totally get why this is. Most of us are busy people with busy lives, and so when we come across a post like “5 Ways to Fix Your Marriage”, or “12 Tips for Awesome Abs”, it grabs our attention and pulls us in. There is something attractive about a nice clean-cut formula – a simple set of principles to apply or steps we can take that will put things right.

But here’s the deal. There are no magic formulas or quick fixes in life.

I’m not saying these tips or steps aren’t helpful. I really believe in the steps I’ve written about. But the reality is that life is complex, and the idea that you can break it down or fix it all in a few steps is rather silly.

The truth is there are a million steps.

And a lot of the time we don’t even know what those steps look like. Or we may not be willing or able to take them at any given moment. And they’re probably different for you and me.

And this is not a bad thing. It’s actually a really good thing. Something that I believe can ultimately bring us closer to God.

As Donald Miller writes in his book Searching For God Knows What, “I have come to believe the sooner we find this truth (that there are a million steps) beautiful, the sooner we will fall in love with the God who keeps shaking things up, keeps changing the path, keeps rocking the boat to test our faith in Him, teaching us to not rely on easy answers, bullet points, magic mantras, or genies in lamps, but rather rely on His guidance, His existence, His mercy, and His love.”

Will I continue to write blogs with “tips” and “ways” to live better and more intentionally? Absolutely! But if you want “21 Steps to Awesomeness”, I’m afraid I can’t help you today. You’re just gonna have to go out there and be awesome all by yourself.