Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is that if you feel unhappy professionally, you
Speaker 1: might not need to change careers. Often people find that
Speaker 1: they are just a few millimeters off from where they
Speaker 1: mean to be, but that one major irritation can significantly
Speaker 1: impact happiness. Solve that and a lot else falls into place.
Speaker 1: Today's tip comes from Ashley Stall's book You Turn, Get Unstuck,
Speaker 1: Discover your direction, and design your dream career. Ashley is
Speaker 1: a career coach who helps people figure out what they
Speaker 1: should be doing with their lives. As I read You Turn,
Speaker 1: I noticed that she used the phrase a few millimeters
Speaker 1: off several times to describe people's professional unhappiness. Here's an example.
Speaker 1: One of Ashley's stories was of a lawyer who felt
Speaker 1: miserable in her job. She was looking to change careers,
Speaker 1: but as she and Ashley talked through her skills and temperament,
Speaker 1: it seemed that she was actually quite well suited to
Speaker 1: the legal world. So they reflected on what she valued,
Speaker 1: and in the middle of her reflections, she mentioned wanting
Speaker 1: to be able to take the time for the things
Speaker 1: she needed to do in her life. Basically, she liked
Speaker 1: the law. She just wanted to have a little more
Speaker 1: space for other things. But that is a reasonably simple
Speaker 1: problem to solve. She switched to a version of law
Speaker 1: that she could practice with more regular hours and less
Speaker 1: evening and weeken work. This made her much happier. She
Speaker 1: remembered why she liked the field in the first place. Now,
Speaker 1: maybe that should seem obvious in retrospect, it's not the
Speaker 1: work someone dislikes, it's the hours. But in many cases
Speaker 1: misery on some day today, dimension of life can expand
Speaker 1: to take up so much mental real estate that it
Speaker 1: is hard to see anything good at all, and so
Speaker 1: we often think that we need to burn it all down,
Speaker 1: find a different career, doing something completely different, or and
Speaker 1: this is a corollary, we become convinced that the only
Speaker 1: avenue to happiness is to do something completely different, go
Speaker 1: back to school and change careers. But if you are
Speaker 1: a mid career professional with a family who is dependent
Speaker 1: on you, that might feel impossible. So you tell yourself
Speaker 1: there is nothing you can do and just plod along,
Speaker 1: and misery come, lanning about life and refusing to accept
Speaker 1: any agency. But what if you considered the possibility that
Speaker 1: you are only a few millimeters off where you should be.
Speaker 1: Take some time to think through what you really value,
Speaker 1: not just what you think you should, but the particular
Speaker 1: things that make you incredibly angry when you don't have them.
Speaker 1: We're on top of the moon if you do. One example,
Speaker 1: someone might like the work they're doing in theory, but
Speaker 1: their manager just doesn't really seem to care about them.
Speaker 1: They might realize that having a champion and mentor it's
Speaker 1: just incredibly important to them and to their happiness. Well,
Speaker 1: guess what. It is often possible to work for someone else.
Speaker 1: You can do this by switching companies, but you might
Speaker 1: not even need to do that. Go work for a
Speaker 1: different manager at the exact same company, and you might
Speaker 1: have an entirely different experience. In my case, I've realized
Speaker 1: over the years that I am happiest writing when I
Speaker 1: get to use my own voice. That's why I like
Speaker 1: blogging and creating these podcasts, scripts and writing books. I
Speaker 1: do write articles from time to time, but it needs
Speaker 1: to be worth it, because I'm not as happy writing
Speaker 1: something that's going to be changed significantly in order to
Speaker 1: create more of a consistent editorial voice for a publication.
Speaker 1: I had to find this out by writing some pieces
Speaker 1: that just wound up feeling draining. So it goes. But
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean writing wasn't for me. It just needed
Speaker 1: to be done differently. So if you are feeling unhappy
Speaker 1: in your day to day work, consider if you might
Speaker 1: be just a few millimeters off from where you should be.
Speaker 1: If you could change one or two things, would you
Speaker 1: still want to do the work you are doing. If so,
Speaker 1: that's great because one or two things can often be changed,
Speaker 1: maybe not immediately, but eventually. A few millimeters is a
Speaker 1: distance easily covered, far more so then walking halfway around
Speaker 1: the world. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening,
Speaker 1: and here's to making the most of our time. Hey, everybody,
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you. You can send me
Speaker 1: your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before Breakfast pod
Speaker 1: that's b the number four than breakfast p o D.
Speaker 1: You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: podcast at iHeart media dot com that Before Breakfast is
Speaker 1: spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much. I
Speaker 1: look forward to staying in Touch Before Breakfast is a
Speaker 1: production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts from I
Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.