The Greatest Feeling

Just before Spring Break, I had the chance to teach a subject to kids in my daughter's class. The subject was poetry, and we went over some of the more popular ones that they teach to that grade, or at least was popular when I was in school that is. Being in front of students and helping them learn something new was, for me, an exhilarating experience. Seeing the wheels turn to come up with something new and poetic gave me a sort of high. I left there after spending that time with a smile on my face, realizing that I definitely would have enjoyed doing just that if I was in a position to finish my degree.

I bet some of you are scratching your head and asking yourself, “Wait…. What does he mean ‘if I was in a position to finish my degree’?” That is a subject for another time.

The point is, I was very happy to do that, and I wanted to do more. Heck, it is part of the reason that I began these blogs. I wanted to get people to learn something new about themselves and the world around them. So…

Consider this…

If you are doing something that you love to do, then this will be more of a review for you. For the rest of us, let’s dive in.

Someone once said, “Choose a job that you love, and you will never work a day in your life.” Well, I could leave at this, and make that dive a really shallow one that leaves you with a concussion. But then I am being just rude and mean. In my life, I have done jobs that allowed me to pay the bills, keep food on the table, a roof over my head, and the power to entertain myself as well as share these thoughts with you. For some of you, you did the same thing. For others, you did it because it made your family happy. For still others, you did it because you didn’t believe that you could ever achieve a level of wit and knowledge that would allow you to take on that dream job that you wanted.

I could sit here and tell you how that thought process is wrong and that you can do anything that you put your mind to, but that is a soapbox that is a little worn and dull. Why, do you ask? Because we are all doing it now. We put our mind to getting the job we are doing. We put our mind to getting the promotion to the position that we are doing now. We put our mind to getting up every morning (or evening, if your schedule runs that way), make ourselves a cup of coffee, get in our cars or on our trains and subways, and do the work that we were hired to do for 40+ hours. The real question is, “Have you smiled and laughed while working, consistently?” And by consistently I mean do you go to work without a feeling of loathing and despair, and leave it with a feeling of joy to finally be free of that godforsaken place. If you have, congratulations. If you haven’t, ask yourself, “Why?” Then, start working on these questions:

• What were the events that took you away from your chosen path?
• What are the things that keep you from your chosen path?
• What are the excuses that you are making to yourself?
• What are the things that you watch others do that make you go, “That would be fun to do”?
• What did you want to be when you grew up?

Ok, now you are really scratching your head on the last two questions here. Think about it for just a moment. If you can tell yourself that it would be nice to do whatever it is that you sit down and watch or listen to, then that most likely means that there is a part of your that wishes that they could do that (not always, but most likely). Or maybe you made one final choice as a kid to do something with your life that you never thought about doing as an adult. Let me give you an example.

As a child, I wanted to be a detective, a fire fighter, a writer, a singer, a king, a general, at teacher, and a baker. As an adult, I chose to work in computers and fix computer related issues. Throughout my career thus far I have done the following:

• Worked on help desk, which allowed me to look at clues and discover solutions and solve mysteries (like a detective). Not to mention, I had to handle outages and large scale issues and keeping tempers down with clients (like a firefighter fighting wild fires).
• I helped friends build a website, and was a contributor to it (like a writer… ok I was a writer for a bit there, and a writer now with the blog).
• I was a shift manager for a fast food restaurant (like a general of an army).
• I came up with new scripts and programs that I used to make my job easier (like a baker making a cake and a writer).

I currently wish that I could be on the Voice to fulfil the singing part of me. And the king… well we’ll see how that all goes when my business gets off the ground. The point is I subconsciously found a way to do all the things that I wanted to do as a child, just not in the way that I ever thought. I still continue to work a job today that mostly fulfils these needs, but it comes up short as I now have other needs that it does not fulfil. That is where this blog and my other project comes in, because when I work on these things, I truly feel as I am free and not working at all.

I leave you with the following video, which I hope drives home the point that you should move to find whatever makes you happy. Find whatever you wish for, and work to make that wish come true. Find what you were trying to tell yourself years ago, before the car and the job, when all you had to worry about is what toy you wanted to play with that day.