Stumbling on Grumpy

Daniel Gilbert is a well-known author of the book Stumbling On Happiness. I've just finished it and to be honest, I’m not sure why he’s so renowned. Gilbert spends the entire book explaining why we are wrong. We can’t predict what will make us happy, our memories are flawed and we can’t even see straight. There is no question that his writing style is entertaining and he has a great sense of humour but I’m really not sure that his chosen topic is ideal, given his outlook.

Anyone who chooses to read a book about happiness, is probably wanting to be happier. Even the process of reading the book made me unhappy as I counted the pages towards the end. I’d favour reading The How of Happiness or the The Happiness Project if you want to work on being happier.

The basic tenet of Gilbert’s book is that we are highly incapable of predicting our future emotions. But why is that so important? Certainly, if we are about to make a big life decision, we’d like to make sure it will bring us happiness. He shows in the research that it’s more accurate to ask someone else in that position how happy it makes them. But no-one can truly be completely in the position you wish to full as they are not you. 

If you know yourself well, you will know what you like, you know where you want to live or who you want to marry or what career to follow. Imagine me asking a writer if it’s fun and basing my future career on that. Wouldn't I be the fool?

I’m expending a great deal of time and effort into knowing my strengths and weaknesses, talents and desires. Once those are completely clear, I can formulate options for my new career, try them out and make a decision. I’m all for talking to people to understand the pros and cons of any role and what others find challenging and rewarding. I like to obtain views from others as my leadership style is affiliatory. But no-one comes with my experiences, background, culture, beliefs, fears, talents and dreams.

Now that I’m finished his book, it’s time to shake things up again. Happiness is not found in monotony, especially for someone right-brained. As mentioned in my previous post, I believe creativity to be one of the key paths to finding yourself and your life passion. My original search for books on how to find your passion yielded few results. But I did come across a book called ‘The Artists Way’, written by Julia Cameron who helps people connect with their innate talents and their creativity. I’m really excited about it and I’m hoping it will unlock something in me that will lead to some real personal growth. 

Passion Pushers

I read an article today about how parents are doing their children a disservice by pushing them to find their passions. Pushing your kids to succeed in a way that helps them get the most out of themselves can be really beneficial. Pushing them to a point where they are unhappy or in negative stress, is just bad parenting.

I’m a huge fan of Elizabeth Gilbert. She knew that writing is what she wanted to do from early on in life. She has also commented on how some of her friends are multi-talented and how that can make it difficult to find your passion. Each path is probably worth exploring, at least a little until you’re ready to make a choice. Ideally, that choice should not be based on how much money you can make, or pressure from anyone, but rather on how you find meaning. 

People discover their passions at varying stages of their lives. I have enjoyed many areas in my past and currently my career path is changing, half way through my career. It might not even end up being that different from my past, but I will be sure that it’s implemented on purpose.  When my parents where choosing a career the options went something like doctor, dentist, lawyer, teacher, secretary. Now, the mere options are inexhaustible and with technology shaping the world so dramatically, the future is open to so much more.

I remember being asked interview questions like “Where will you be in ten years’ time?” I always thought that it’s a ridiculous question because we simply cannot predict the opportunities that come our way. That seems like quite a reactive thought to have, but early on in my career I found it difficult to have a strong vision. Only once I really had exposure to the things I enjoyed and didn't enjoy, did I start to form an idea of where I’m going. Now I also realise that I may not have pursued the correct passion, although I've had success. The Best Possible Future Self I developed at age 25 would look really different from the one I've created recently. 

It can be a minefield to navigate, and a decision can only be made once you know yourself well. I believe it takes courage to change career paths since it challenges your identity and how people see you. But it's naive to expect to know everything at the start. 

This week I watched a documentary on the band Queen. Watching footage of how they found inspiration for some famous songs, was truly amazing. The reading I've done on finding your flow emphasises the need for concentration, and typically that needs to happen while you’re alone. How wonderful that a group of four people, each bringing their special talents to the mix, can participate in a flow experience regularly to create something so beautiful.

I suppose I have had discussions in my work environment with Software Developers where we debated and discussed the solutions, and together found a great result that we could not have accomplished alone. Being a Managing Director does not accommodate that kind of flow experience unfortunately. Perhaps the Peter Principle is not the issue but rather the principle where you are promoted out of your flow. Maybe that’s why management is so grumpy and demanding.

Finding your passion can be automatic or it can take decades. As a parent, my role is to nurture them and to facilitate their path, not to push in a direction that I see. I'd like to be an enabler to them and if they take 30 years to find their passion, it was faster than me.

Finding flow can be a challenging exercise, that can take a really long time. No-one can really push you there – you do have to find it yourself. At 40 years old I’m still exploring aspects of myself, discovering what I loved when I was younger, and formulating ideas on what my future could look like. Although I’m not known for my patience, I believe rushing things would be a big mistake. My priority now is to recover to full health and while doing so, experience more things that I enjoy. Hopefully along the way my future career passion will come to light.

What makes you mad?

A few of the articles and blog posts I've read recommend that you notice when you're getting mad. What accomplishments, jobs or activities of other people get you riled up? The emotion might also be envy. I gave it a lot of thought and I discovered I had experienced these emotions in two areas.

Firstly, those yoga moms who saunter out of their Porsche Cayenne, dripping with jewellery and looking awfully smug. I remember when I was on leave, getting very irritated when I did yoga at 9:30 am and seeing a mom from school in the class. It’s not that I wish I were not working, because I know that I have to work to remain sane. It’s more that they have freedom to look after themselves and there is still enough money to support a family. I've sacrificed a great deal of earnings over the past five years in order to run the business. Not only did I spend all day doing what I didn't enjoy, but I had no time for myself. Being unhappy with my routine of getting kids to school and feeling that I had to be at the office ‘just in case’, caused me to resent the people who have the flexibility for a mid-morning yoga class.

In the past few months, I have had the personal insight that I’d prefer to have flexible time and not be desk-bound all day. I’d gladly take a pay cut to enjoy more flexible hours and be able to spend some time looking after myself and helping my kids. I now have a healthy respect for those who have organised their schedules in such a way to bring in money but also enjoy life. There are those who work a four day week or those who work for a few hours in the morning and spend time with their kids in the afternoons. How have you arranged your working life around your needs?

The second thing that stirred up emotion for me was those who have written books. One that comes to mind is a friend who published a book in 2013. I most definitely was not mad because he’s truly a valuable person with much insight to offer. I wish him all the success with the book, the proceeds of which he even gives to charity. Not to mention the fact that we were featured in the book for our financial savvy! But I did feel envious when the book got published and remember wishing that I could publish a book.

I went to a seminar about six months ago and the very flashy presenter with tight pants and a shimmering smile spoke of ‘writing’ his book. He quite openly admitted that it was too much trouble to actually write the book and he had outsourced it.  At that moment, my dream diminished substantially. Nevertheless, I have not let go of that dream to write a book myself, with my own special flavour and style, that at least my friends will read.

I have spoken about the process of finding your passion and not to worry too much about monetising it initially. At first I wondered why you would write and publish something for someone else. It’s as hard as being a surrogate mother. But I suppose it’s not that strange that people are ghost writers since it’s a method of turning writing into revenue, which you cannot fault anyone for doing.

I previously did consulting work and do still enjoy putting together the documentation. For some, it is torture and they’d outsource it gladly. For me, it is the real joy of structuring solutions and making recommendations from a broad range of inputs. Another insight is that I'd like to include writing in my future career. Writing a book may end up being a personal goal or a hobby if you wish, but that’s fine too. The process of writing brings flow to my day and that's what I need. 

Mind Body Connection

I’m amazed at how some of my relatives seem to believe that the mind and body are totally separate. Do they think the brain is just floating around in there, disconnected from the body? I am a strong believer that our thoughts affect our health. For me this is an obvious conclusion, given that I have developed a stress-related condition. After all, stress is just a collection of thoughts that result in physiological symptoms.

One of the things I’m ensuring is that I weed out negative thoughts and negative people in my life. I need to make sure that I have a fertile environment for reducing my stress. From what I've read there seem to be an awful lot of people who don’t like themselves and their thoughts are flooded with self-criticism and negativity. That really doesn't serve anyone. I certainly don’t hate myself at all and I believe life is full of opportunities and joy if you’re willing to do the work to notice and capture it.

Some of that work may be forgiving yourself, or forgiving someone else. The letting go is often a very powerful exercise in releasing the burdens carried by most of us.  This is starting to sound quite esoteric but I don’t believe there’s anything strange about doing some housekeeping in our emotions and thoughts. Clean up and get rid of the clutter. Nip those negative thoughts in the bud before they get rooted.

I love this post from Tiny Buddha about changing your life trajectory: http://tinybuddha.com/blog/changing-trajectory-live-life-purpose/ . For some of my relatives, the fact that I read something with ‘Buddha’ in it, and even referenced it, is tantamount to heresy. “Oh no, she’s abandoning her faith!” Doing yoga is surely to send some of them into cardiac arrest. Yet these are the things that help us connect body and mind.

I’m pretty sure that God wants us to be happy and to live full lives, following our passion. But we do actually have to take some action, other than prayer, to make our lives fulfilling. I’m sure many of you have heard that joke about God sending various forms of rescue to the idiot who is not listening. How many of us are making assumptions about how our prayers will be answered, so much so that we don’t notice that we actually received what we needed, not what we asked for? As far as I’m concerned, prayer and meditation are not mutually exclusive. Let’s be open to trying new things, from which we can learn and perhaps receive something we weren't expecting.