The
Top Career Road Blocks and How to Hurdle them.
Part
1 of a 10 part series in making your career change happen. Stay tuned to get there...
Road
Block One The Armchair Career Change
For
those of you who have been thinking about what you want to do, but still find
yourself staring at the same wall or ceiling – you’ve hit the classic careershift
road block. Here’s
what we do, we think….. and think…… and think…..and THINK about what we would
really like to do, but we don’t DO anything about it.
If
that’s the case with you, the chances are you’ve been asking yourself one of
these questions:
1.What could I do
2.What on earth could I do
Coupled
with A LOT of ‘if-onlys’:
1.If only I knew what I wanted to do
2.If only I had made better choices
3.If only I was younger
4.If only I could afford to change
Now,
as intelligent and (occasionally) rational beings, thinking is an essential
cognitive process through which we try and understand ourselves and our world.
And of course you need to think through things if you’re considering what to do
next. But at some level it becomes counterproductive: you go around in a loop,
going over the same well worn questions, feeling the same old fears, and arriving
nowhere. Again!
So,
you need an injection of something new. Einstein is famous for saying ‘No
problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it”. He
also said ‘Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It
takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite
direction.’
What’s
needed is a fresh perspective. External input. Tangible information. First,
pick a primary question – what am I actually good at, what am I really interested in, how could
I do x,
what’s involved in profession y –and make it your mission to find out.I have worked with hundreds of people
through career change and I know that the difference between those that do and
those that don’t... is…well, those that DO. Plus you may not realize it, but
all those years of thinking will have brewed some ideas. You just haven’t DONE
anything about them. YET.
There’s
(rather inconveniently) no such thing as a ‘remote control’ career change. You
can’t do it in your head sitting on your sofa - no more than you can get fit by
watching sport on the telly. You have to get out there and follow a line of inquiry through, taking yourself out of your head and into the world. But it
doesn’t have to be a marathon. Just get started – buy some buy some joggers and kick start yourself with a trainer;
take the stairs and cycle in. It’s mostly the small everyday stuff, not
the grand action plans that count…
