Do You have a Passion or a Paycheck? Part 3 There’s Homework!
Pretend tomorrow you got to wake up doing your dream job. Some of us automatically know what that is and go to it mentally while others of us struggle with what exactly that would entail. And some of us may already be doing our dream job (show offs-kidding most of us are slightly jealous). If a dream job didn’t automatically pop into your head, or if the word “Passion” makes you break out in a cold sweat, or if you’re open to learning a little more about yourself, keep reading.
Now think about when you were a child and people asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up. Teacher, fireman, police officer, doctor, attorney-sure those are all amazing jobs and we need people to do them; but for many of us, the dream job is one that doesn’t really exist. For many years, I loved working in surgical device sales but trust that no guidance counselor in my high school offered that as an option in the 90’s.
It does exist but we usually want to put a job description in an easy little title and move on from there. Let’s break it down even further. Don’t think about the dream job in terms of one that already exists, think about 5 things you love doing (has to contain an action word) followed with who the action impacts or how the actions impacts you. It can be anything. Maybe you just like talking to people and hearing their stories or you like helping people, maybe you just love laughing, or like spending time with your family. Great, there is no right or wrong answer. And it’s not always easy to just think of 5 things off the top of our heads (and that’s part of the problem).
It’s also hard not to let the goal dictate this exercise. Don’t think of this exercise as finding the dream job, simply think of the actions words that you love and the impact portion. Print this page and keep it with you for the next couple of days. And by the time 5 pm rolls around Friday, you should have been able to think of 5 things you love doing and run each of the words through the exercise below:
Action word –> do you want the action word to impact others –> do you want the action word to impact you
Example: Laugh
I like to make people laugh and I like when people make me laugh.
Or you may only love making people laugh.
Or you may only want to have people make you laugh.
(There is no right or wrong answer. Remember the more honest you are the better. The lies we tell ourselves are far worse than any that anyone could ever tell us. So be brutally honest with yourself).
We’ll move on to Do you have a Passion or Paycheck? (Part 4) Next Wednesday.
1. Action Word/Impact
2. Action Word/Impact
3. Action Word/Impact
4. Action Word/Impact
5. Action Word/Impact
Jonathan
I’m disappointed by this article. There are many great ideas in here. It proceeds,however like there’s some point to it all that writing all our results are going to be be input into some “analyzer” which is going localize the searcher’s direction. But it doesn’t, it does what any shrink does, it gives you a homework assignment and then relies on YOU to figure out YOU. the way I remember talking to one of those people and eventually finding out that I was there just to listen to myself talk. I can do that for free and I DO. This last section is supposed to be interactive, but it’s just more fill-in-the-blank activities. And now what? we read over what we we already knew about ourselves and then then try to find a pattern out in the world. I can save everybody some time. Nobody only wants a paycheck, we choose that path when we find that there’s nothing that we feel is reachable that inspires us. Everybody loves money, but not because it’s money, because of what money enables us to use it for. Even it all you want to do is hang out with your friends and drink there’s a passion in this that’s deeper than just getting paid. This should be called, “Do you have a passion or are you too lazy to take the initiative?”.
Melayna Lokosky
Hi Jonathan-Thank you for reading and your honest feedback regarding the Passion or Paycheck Four part series. Sadly, there is no “analyzer” in the sense you’re thinking. The “analyzer” is you! If we expect others to figure it out for us then where is the personal accountability for our own lives? These exercises were intended to get the reader to think in a way differently than they previously had (the if we always do what we always did we’ll always get what we always got theory). Several things have to take place for this exercise to work. One, the desire for change and growth and second, a willingness to do the work (and if it were easy then everyone would do it) and third, taking stock in your life honestly (the lies we tell ourselves are far worse than any ever told to us).
Jonathan I also wanted to make sure you saw there was a Part 4 to the series where I run my homework through the last test which helped point me in the right direction (See one, do one, teach one model). And if you’ve done the homework and need a little help send it along and let’s see what we can do with your data. Again, thank you for reading, and let’s try and work on turning the disappointment into a passion. I can be reached at MelaynaLokosky (at) gmail (dot) com or feel free to post here and receive feedback from other readers as well.