There are a myriad of obstacles that can block our path to feeling truly satisfied with our lives. Occupational choices that no longer fit, untenable relationships, painful work-life contexts, to name a few. Tolerating those impediments, coupled with not being true to ourselves, is a path to distress and unhappiness.
The concept of mentoring has been relevant for thousands of years. A mentor is usually someone older and more experienced than the mentee, willing to share knowledge and experience, provide advice and wisdom based on specific expertise. A mentor is someone who may help you with your career, specific work projects, or provide general career-life advice. A mentor rarely provides guidance for personal gain.
Most mentors exhibit the following qualities and skills:
Bullying is a form of physical, psychological or verbal abuse. It involves one person or a group of persons picking on another individual or group of individuals. The bully is perceived as having more power over the person or group being bullied.
Physical bullying can include hitting, shoving, tripping, even sexual assault. Psychological bullying may include controlling the other through intimidation, ganging up, exclusion, gossiping or undermining a person's position or competencies.
While traditionally the word vocation has been used to describe a person, typically male, being called by God to a particular role, it's now used in a secular context, along with words like work, profession, or occupation. This article explores the question What does vocation look like for today's woman?"
Every adult moves through several important and predictable stages in their career-life journey, with the ending of one stage and the beginning of the next involving a period of adjustment.
In his well-known book Transitions, William Bridges explains that transitions involve 1) an ending, followed by 2) a period of confusion and distress, leading to 3) a new beginning. He warns us that the transition process can take its' "toll on us physically as well as mentally and socially."
This article is a personal reflection on my career journey that I hope will inspire others to know their truth.
"We are best motivated for work not by being pushed into it or by outside compensation but by inner desire." Matthew Fox, author of The Reinvention of Work.
"Our lives are shaped as profoundly by personality as by gender or race."
Susan Cain author of Quiet
The persistent fact that 60% of people are dissatisfied with their job has several contributing factors, with the most significant a poor fit between occupational choice and personality. In the book Do What You Are, the authors tell us that the right job becomes personally fulfilling when it nourishes the most important aspects of our personality.
"She felt that old generic guilt, the kind you feel even when you can't think of what in the world you are supposed to have done." Meg Wolitzer
Guilt is the experience of a person thinking or feeling that she has done somethingshe should not have, or has not done something she should have. Either way,the person experiencing this emotion takes responsibility for the circumstance.
“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” ― C.G. Jung
We human beings are social animals with an innate drive for being in relationship with others. Consider societies' use of banning, shunning, or isolation as punishment,or even "time out" for kids to understand how important relationships are to our well-being. Fortunately, most of us have the opportunity to be in meaningful relationships every day in our families, workplaces, schools and communities.