Alexandersmap

    Category: Career

    • Work and Love

      “The wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the least of all the blades of grass; And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving. Work is love made visible.” – Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

      Today is Labor Day in the United States, a day of rest for many (not all), and an opportunity to reflect on this thing called work. If you’re doing work you love, then Gibran’s words will resonate. If you’re doing work that grinds your soul to dust, you might think his words are ridiculous. But to live a fulfilling life, shouldn’t that which we labor in be loved?

      Piecing words together isn’t hard labor, but any writer knows that it’s work. Paradoxically, if writing every day is work, it must reverberate with love to be enjoyable for the reader. The jury is still out on this writer.

      In my working life I’ve done everything from sweeping up broken glass to managing salespeople in a Fortune 500 company. I took as much care removing every sliver of glass from the ground as I did managing the emotional response to a quarterly review. Work is love made visible, otherwise it’s self-immolation.

      So on this rare day of rest in our hustling culture, what do we celebrate? A break from the grind or a moment to recharge before leaping back into the joy of a meaningful career? Especially now, somewhere between a pandemic and normal, work should be celebrated for where it brings us in our lives, and for what we may give back to others.

      What can we be great at? Shouldn’t we put our heart and soul into that which transcends work? To rise above the daily grind to joyful, purposeful labor seems the only path to a full life.

    • Tides and Time

      “Eventually tides will be the only calendar you believe in.” – Mary Oliver, To Begin With, the Sweet Grass

      We get so caught up in schedules and appointments and such, when all that really matters is conversation and honoring commitments and that most intangible thing of all: progress. Are we progressing in the direction we pointed ourselves in or not? What do you do with the answer to that question?

      Like many, I’m fascinated with people that step off the calendar and follow their own path. The through-hikers and ocean cruisers and the off-the-gridders who opt out of the stories we tell ourselves about time. The older I get the more I recognize the story of time isn’t always in sync with my own natural rhythm.

      So do you reconcile this in your life? Do you favor deadlines and schedules that dictate so much of our short stack of trips around the sun? Or do you prioritize living by your own rhythm? I should think the closer you are to the latter the more fulfilling your life might be.

    • Leaping Forward

      Inevitably around the early days of September I start thinking about the end of the year, of the beginning of a new year, and of the things I said I’d do that I haven’t done. Sure, sometimes I’ll linger on the things I did do, but I don’t find it all that productive to pat myself on the back for past accomplishments. There’s nothing wrong with being happy with where you are, but if that’s your frame of mind you generally aren’t in a hurry to turn it upside down for something else. Growth lies in discomfort, and you can’t be satisfied with where you are if you hope to do more in your time.

      To leap forward requires vacating the spot you currently reside in. New habits, new conversations, new attitudes about what is possible and what you’ll let yourself get away with. Leaps are exciting and a little intimidating. Sometimes really, really intimidating. So most people settle for baby steps instead. Less risky, maybe, or maybe it’s a way to trick yourself into thinking you’re making progress without the discomfort of having both feet in the air at the same time, not entirely certain where you might land.

      This isn’t a leap year, not if you use the calendar to tell you where you are in life anyway. But leaping is an attitude, not a story we all tell ourselves about what day it is. Every year can be a leap year if you want it to be. Leaping doesn’t require burning the boats, but it does require commitment. You can’t very well change your mind after you launch yourself. So decide the direction you want to go in and how far to leap (what you might want to become) and launch yourself that way with resolve.

      It’s a thrill when you wind up and go for it. Doesn’t this short life deserve that kind of thrill? Decide what to be and go be it. I hope to see you there.

    • The Thing We Ought to Be

      “The ideal life, the life of completion, haunts us all; we feel the thing we ought to be beating beneath the thing we are. We are haunted by an ideal life, and it is because we have within us the beginning and the possibility of it” – Phillips Brooks

      It sneaks up on you now and then, this feeling. It’s a nagging call for action, Thoreau described it as quiet desperation, a feeling that you’re living below your dreams and see no path to reach them. But he would also remind us that it’s okay to build these castles in the air, just build the foundations underneath them.

      What do we make of ourselves when we know what we ought to be?

      How we reconcile this in our own lives is how we determine for ourselves whether we lived a successful life on our deathbed. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. When you pause in a quiet moment in the day and reflect on where you are and where you’re going, do you like the answer?

      The haunting is a call to action.

    • Towards Exciting Things

      “That’s the whole secret: to do things that excite you.” – Ray Bradbury

      Truth be told, there are many things we do every day that aren’t exciting, yet we keep on doing them anyway. This is the attractive rut of doing the same thing: familiar and predictable and comfortable. But does it stir the soul?

      If we agree that life is short, shouldn’t we pursue that which excites us? I know, we’ve all gotta make a living, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t find the fun in both work and living. And if life is short, why waste years of it doing things that bore you to tears? Shake yourself out of the rut and dive into the deep work. The meaningful and enlightening. The exciting stuff.

      For most of us, exciting is reserved for vacations and weekends. I should think a healthy dose of exciting ought to be injected into each day. Too bold an ask? What are we here for if not to feel the thrill of stepping beyond your comfort zone? Too old? When are you going to get younger than now? If not now, when? If we’re going to slowly fade, why not use our brightest days moving towards exciting things?

      Really, this shouldn’t be that much of a secret.

    • What Dies With You?

      “Imagine if you will being on your death bed – And standing around your bed – the ghosts of the ideas, the dreams, the abilities, the talents given to you by life.

      And that you for whatever reason, you never acted on those ideas, you never pursued that dream, you never used those talents, we never saw your leadership, you never used your voice, you never wrote that book.

      And there they are standing around your bed looking at you with large angry eyes saying we came to you, and only you could have given us life! Now we must die with you forever.

      The question is – if you die today what ideas, what dreams, what abilities, what talents, what gifts, would die with you? ” – Les Brown

      You may have heard a version of this in a Denzel Washington commencement speech with something like 40 million views, but the framework for this story is older than that, and as far as I can tell, Les Brown was the first to tell it. And honestly, his version flows better than Denzel’s, and thus quotes better.

      I’ve been thinking about this lately myself. Whether to keep blogging or focus on the bigger writing I want to do. Whether to travel and explore to the level I want to or defer until some undefined, unlikely time in the future. Asking myself, what do you finish when you don’t have an infinite lifetime?

      Questions demand answers. Most of us distract ourselves from thinking about these things. Our lives are filled with white noise and busywork, but eventually we need to reckon with our ghosts.

      What dreams, abilities, talents and gifts will die with you? We can’t do everything in life, but surely we can do more. So what will you bring to life before you go?

    • Dancing in the Gap

      “Don’t lament so much about how your career is going to turn out. You don’t have a career, you have a life.” – Cheryl Strayed

      “Cease to be a drudge, seek to be an artist.” – Mary McLeod Bethune

      “I knew I had been transformed, moved by the revelation that human beings create art, that to be an artist was to see what others could not.” – Patti Smith

      Today is a Friday. which in the world of work means something to the majority of people making a living. Back in the day, Thursday and Friday night meant having a few drinks after work to wait out the traffic, commiserate about the grind suffered in earnest that week, and to talk of plans for the weekend.

      I’m done climbing that particular ladder. But I haven’t quite weened myself off being a drudge. But I fight and cajole myself towards some measure of artistry. Admittedly, it’s an odd place to reside. I know people who delight in their drudgery and shun artistry. I find that they live the rest of their lives in a similar fashion.

      We’ve built this social structure where taking one for the team and being a cog is celebrated. Cheryl Strayed is right to point out that your career is merely a part of your life, but it’s a big part. Aren’t we obligated to rise above the grind? We all know salespeople and engineers and accountants who spin delightful work out of what others might view as drudgery. Life is what you make of it, and so is your career. You can and should create beautiful art in your daily work.

      I’m particularly excited about a couple of projects I’m working on in my career. I’d like to weave a bit more art into each, and really, that ambition to raise the project to a level above the norm is where artists begin their work day. So what if it’s a sculpture or a PowerPoint presentation; make it beautiful.

      Our short, fragile lives are built on whimsy and chance and a bit of gumption. So why succumb to drudgery? Why not begin a notch or two above the norm and see how much you can stretch yourself? To dance in the gap between drudgery and art is to lift yourself beyond a job or a task to a place where the beautiful and noteworthy begins.

    • Breaking Garden (and Life) Rules

      I regularly break the accepted rules of gardening. Rules like putting the tall plants in the back of the garden. But when something like a balloon flower (Platycodon grandiflorus) or bee balm (Monarda) are shoved way to the back you lose something intimate that you gain when they’re right in your face. So my apologies to the garden rule enforcers. Surely you see my dilemma?

      I was offering advice to a former coworker who wants to quite her job and travel the world with her husband, but she feels stuck in the job, stuck in the life she’s wrapped herself in, and is only looking at the reasons why she can’t just do it instead of finding the reasons to just go for it. I dropped my favorite pair of Latin phrases on her to reflect on: Memento Mori and Carpe Diem (Remember we all must die, and seize the day!).

      Some rules are there for logical reasons; if the tall plants are up front you can’t see the shorter ones behind them. Makes sense. Some rules are there because we’ve all grown up believing stories: you have to get a job and work 50 weeks a year, then skip one of the two weeks of vacation and work on weekends to stay ahead. Who made that rule? Someone who wants to profit on your short productive years before they turn you to dust and plan you out for someone else.

      Make your own rules. Rules like walking out in the middle of a work day and seeing how the flowers are doing, just because you feel like it. Putting yourself out there in the world, to meet it on your terms. And maybe find something of yourself that was hidden when it was shoved to the back by someone else’s rules.

      Balloon Flower

    • Decide

      “In a world where death is the hunter, my friend, there is not time for regrets or doubts. There is only time for decisions.” – Carlos Castaneda, Journey To Ixtlan

      If you happen to glance at a calendar today you’ll note that the month is quickly disappearing into history. Soon it will join all the other months in our past, dead time to us but for the memories. So what do we make of our time? As Castaneda points out, it tends to be what we decide to make of it.

      I witnessed two remarkable people graduate yesterday, one a year after his graduation ceremony was cancelled, the other virtually because they aren’t allowing large gatherings yet. If I were to give advice, I’d suggest figuring out your it and then getting to it straight away. There’s urgency in every decision now. Moments are fleeting, and are to be embraced, but decide on a path and put everything into it. There’s vibrancy in boldly going after your grandest dreams.

      The advice isn’t just for graduates, it’s for all of us. A college graduate knows all too well the decisions that placed them in that cap and gown, and so do the rest of us. Simply decide what you want to spend the short time you have left in this world doing. What brings meaning and purpose to you? What makes you excited to begin another day? For otherwise we’re just drifting aimlessly, wasting our one chance.

      If that seems overly urgent, well, it’s meant to be. We must live with the urgency Castaneda demands from us. If you want to be or do something in this world you can’t waste this present. Decide what to be and go be it. There’s no vibrancy in indecision.

    • Something Bigger Than Yourself

      “This idea of ‘just follow your passion’, I don’t even have an understanding of what that means. Even though my whole life I have been very clear about the way I wanted to create change, and for whom, it wasn’t this out of the box understanding that we were going to use different forms of capital and support it with the right kind of talent to work a system to create real change …. I would say just start.

      Don’t start by asking ‘what is my purpose’, what is my passion? Start by asking what are the problems that need to be solved? Which ones attract me? And take a step towards that. Take one step and the work will teach you where you need to take the next step. Build tools in your toolbox. If you still don’t know what your passion or your purpose is after you take those steps, follow a leader and learn from that leader. There’s something so powerful… in apprenticing. I would say I apprenticed for fifteen years. And… skipping steps, particularly because life is shorter than we think it is and it’s longer than we think it is, it doesn’t serve the world and it doesn’t serve you.

      Just commit to something. This we don’t tell young people, or even old people. We don’t expect that enough. I think the cult of the individual is also the cult of optionality. And the secret is that when you commit to something, particularly something bigger than yourself, it will set you free. And suddenly you will find a freedom and layering of life that you never understood you had.” – Jacqueline Novagratz, from The Tim Ferriss Show

      The funny thing about Commencement speeches is that they’re full of grand visions and language and guidance for the graduating class. Yet few ever act on the very best advice they hear that day. The quotes above offer some of the best advice I’ve come across for people stepping out into the unknown world of their “career path”: Build tools in your toolbox. Take one step towards solving the problems that need solving, and then another. See where it takes you. When you’re unsure, find a leader worth following and learn from them.

      The thing is, this isn’t just timely advice for the Class of 2021 (or the frustrated Class of 2020 for that matter). It’s great advice for any of us from someone who has walked the path, tripped a few times along the way and risen to greater heights as a result. For all the talk of changing the world most people profess in unguarded moments of truth, the vast majority of us walk the path of career growth and embrace the cult of the individual (living my best life!). There’s nothing wrong with individualism, it just doesn’t do much to change the world.

      Deeper in the interview, Novagratz speaks of tackling problems that won’t be solved in our lifetime. There are plenty to choose from: poverty, racial equality, fixing the climate change mess and a hundred other problems that warrant solutions but are too big for one person to tackle. It’s a funny thing, thinking about taking on a project that you won’t live to see solved. But aren’t we all working to create things that will outlive us? Raising children, building a business, making art, writing… all are beyond ourselves. And so is meaningful change.

      When I hear someone like Novagratz speak, I recognize the small thinking I’ve been guilty of in my own lifetime. Thinking about things bigger than yourself is a path towards immortality, in a way. It’s creating something that will outlive you. Shouldn’t it be something that positively alters the course of humanity? If that seems too bold, well, maybe we aren’t giving ourselves enough credit for what we might accomplish. If we’d just commit and do the work. The work of our lifetime.