Archive for the ‘Finding Passion’ Category

Passion Makes Work More Meaningful

Oct 17th, 11 / 0 Comments

Passion – the dictionary defines passion as “any powerful or compelling emotion or feeling, as love or hate”.   What is it that you have a passion for?  When I ask my clients what they are passionate about I get a variety of answers.  Recently one said to me that his country had been good to him now he wanted to give back.  Another said she wanted to insure that her children to grow up in an earth without pollution.

Creating a vision allows a person to harness the energy of his/her passion.  What will happen when he gives back or when she eliminates pollution?  How will the world look once their vision has been fulfilled?

Whether you are looking for employment, working in a job or practicing law you need to have the passion to convince others that your vision is important to them too.  Can you convince everyone?  Probably not, but you do want some help from those who agree with you.   When you do find work that supports your passion the work will be meaningful to you.

Many Interviews but no job offer

Recently a client asked me to tell him why after several interviews he had not received even one job offer.  He thought he had done really well at the interviews.  He was comfortable that he had answered all the questions intelligently and completely.  Still there were no job offers.

Without being there of course it is hard to know why he did not get a job offer.  Sometimes there is no good reason!  However when I listened to his answers to simple interview questions about why he wanted a particular job I could hear that he wasn’t very convincing.  There was no audible passion.

When I suggested he be really enthusiastic about his past accomplishments and then let the interviewer hear what he would do in the position they had open, he objected.  He said in interviewing people himself he felt someone who “oversold” what he or she could do was full of BS.

I agree you can’t be phony about this.  It must come from the heart.  You must show that “love or hate.”  How do you show someone else by the way you talk that you love this country and want to give back or that you hate pollution and want to get rid of it?  It takes more than just saying the words.

Marketing actions must come from the heart too.

A lawyer client complained that his young associate did not take marketing action steps with the same energy and enthusiasm that he had done when he was just starting out.  He had made several suggestions to her but she did not follow any them.

To help her to find her passion I suggested he ask her what it is that drove her to the practice law.  What did she love about it?  First she must find that genuine feeling that ignites her and then she can share it with others.  Sharing your passion is the first step in building relationships.

Passion gives you the energy to enthusiastically meet the work day 

What is it that makes you jump out of bed in the morning ready to meet the work day?  What kind of work do you want to be doing every day?  In order to do that kind of work you will need to find others who share your enthusiasm about your vision and passion and want to help you make it a reality.

As you probably have guessed by now I am passionate about people doing the work they love. My goal is to help as many people as I can to find the kind of work they are really passionate about.  This may mean changing careers or just finding the spark in the work that they already do so they can work in a way that sets them apart from others.   I share my passion through my newsletter, my blog, my website and my practice.  I believe that the world would be a better place if we all were happy at work! Can I help you to find your passion and vision?  Call me at 781-598-0388 or email me at asparker@asparker.com.

Be sure to read the September 2010 Parker’s Points 10 ways to Display Passion.

 

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Career Changers, Finding Passion, Interview Tips, Lawyers

What Do You Do During Tough Times?

Oct 25th, 10 / 2 Comments

Do you have a hard time figuring out what you are passionate about?  It was hard for me too.

This month though I found a new way to find it and although the circumstances are not what I would wish for anyone, everyone has tough times at some time in their lives so this might work for you too..

My mother who is 96 came down with bronchitis at the end of September.  Two days after the doctor had diagnosed her she got worse so I called an ambulance to take her to the hospital.

She spent a week in the hospital sleeping most of the time.   She woke only for meals or to say hello to me when she became aware that I was there.  She was extremely weak and tired.

The next week they moved her to a rehabilitation hospital and diagnosed her with pneumonia.  It was another week before we saw any signs that she was getting better.

Recovery has been very slow.  All that time she basically slept and ate a little-mostly slept.  There was only one other thing that she consistently did each day and that was the daily bridge game in the Boston Globe and the ones in the New York Times on Monday and Thursday.  Sick as she was she managed to muster up enough energy to do that and then go back to sleep.  Clearly she has a passion for bridge.

Needless to say I was concerned about my mother and so I stayed at the hospital 5 or 6 hours a day.  The only things I attended to were my client calls and writing my newsletter.

From these two activities I got amazing relief from the stress.  Once I began a call or started to write everything else vanished and I could think about only what I was doing.  Other activities did not hold my attention.  That is why I had over 300 messages in my email in box!!

So if you are having trouble finding what you are passionate about, look at the kind of things you find pleasure in even when times are tough and you have a huge problem in your life.  Look for something that you enjoy like bridge for my mother and writing and coaching for me. It will be something that absorbs in a way that makes you forget your troubles-something you want to continue forever and that makes everything else bearable.

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Attitude, Career Changers, Finding Passion, Lawyers

Uncovering Your Passion So That You Can Be Happy At Work

Sep 22nd, 10 / 0 Comments

Are you happy at work?  Do you have passion for the work that you do?  The notion of passion was something that mystified me early on in my career.  I was usually happy at work but the feeling of passion eluded me.  In fact up until I retired from AT&T,  I only got brief glimpses of what got my juices flowing.  What exactly was my calling?

Because my style is low key I often have difficulty identifying and displaying the emotion I feel about something.  It is one reason I have taken Improv classes. The emotion is there inside but never got exposed.  Improv has helped me to display my feelings more easily and in a bigger way.

Since the passion was there all the time, it was more about labeling and allowing myself to feel it.  Unfortunately during my career I was usually too busy making a living to take the time to think about this. That was my loss.

Now I can see that for the most part I was lucky to find jobs that were meaningful and important to me.  Only once in my career was I placed in a job that I had no passion for and I did feel stuck!!  That is not a place you want to be or a feeling you want to experience.  Feeling stuck is a signal that you need to reenergize yourself in that job or find a new job!

In Parker’s Points this month I wrote about how to display passion at an interview.  Shortly after I published the article, I read an article in GP Solo entitled Where’s Your Passion?

The author Attorney Jennifer Ator talks about missing her calling which she says might have been to be a librarian or bookstore owner.  She loves the look, feel and smell of books.  She talks about how she has learned to integrate that passion into her work and her life.  She believes that knowing her passion has made her a better lawyer.

Finding your passion and then using that energy in your work helps give meaning to the work that you do.  Attorney Ator has found ways outside of her law practice to do what she is passionate about and the energy that she gets outside her practice spills over into her law practice.  That is one way to use your passion.  There are others.

I’ve had a client create a side business so that he could put his passion to work.  For my client the side business remained a side line but for others it could take over as the main source of income.  Either way can lead to a satisfying and fulfilling career and life.

Other people have found ways to use their passion in the marketing of the practice.  Their passion might be in the area of sports for example. Since the purpose of marketing is to build relationships with prospects, an attorney might share his/her enthusiasm for the local team with a prospect or a client, he/she might invite a client to a sporting event, or he/she could play the sport with the client.

Of course ideally you have a passion for the work that you do.  One attorney I worked with said her strongest value was justice.  She felt the judicial system was unfair to the disadvantaged person whom she saw as primarily the elderly and women.  Her passion was to use the law as a tool to prevent future difficult situations for her clients. She is an Elder Law attorney.

In my practice I help attorneys (and others) to connect or reconnect to their passion in a way that gives my clients a whole new perspective on themselves  Finding your passion can lead to a more profitable and fulfilling practice.

The author of the article Where’s Your Passion? says that rediscovering your passion will take some thought.  I agree. It isn’t something you can do overnight.  But you will gain a lot of self knowledge along the way as you take the steps necessary to get there.  If you want to be happy at work it definitely worth doing!!

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Finding Passion