Join hundreds of thousands of people around the world increasing their personal and professional performance
The topic for today, Day 79 of the 100 Day Personal Performance and Business Growth Challenge is “Finding a Career You Love.” How many of you can truthfully say that you wake up each morning and pinch yourself because you have a career that you absolutely love? How many of you live for your work, love it, every ounce of your being looks forward to doing what you do? How many of you wish to be doing your work on the weekend when you aren’t supposed to be working?
Let me give you an example. A couple of years ago, I had gone on a trip to Fiji to rest and recharge myself. I decided that I would just sit in the lounge chair and be in the moment, listening to the waves and all the other sounds on the beach, such as the birds chirping. One hour, two hours, three hours, and I was just there enjoying the bliss of the moment. When fully calm, I started listening closely to what my intuition, my inner guide was telling me that I should be doing. It was a deep question geared at finding out what my DNA was designed to do.
Sometimes, you have to get really quiet to hear that calling. You have to disconnect from everything around you, all the distractions, and just feel it. I was just there, trying to listen for it. What did I really want to do? What would I pay to be allowed to do? What is so exciting to me that I would pay to take part in? What am I curious about? What things naturally excite me or call to me and make me feel alive? What things, if they were the only things I would be allowed to do today, would I be wildly grateful for? If, by any chance, that was my last day and I had an opportunity to do something to leave behind, what would that be?
You know, the stuff that makes my blood turn, that excite me, might be different from what appeals to you or anyone else. So, what makes you feel most alive? What are you proud to do every day? What is it that brings your soul to life and elevates who you are? What brings out the best of you to the whole world? I hope and pray that you get to call that thing your job, your work, your profession. I am sorry to say that most people don’t.
How do you find that one thing that brings you alive? Number one, you have to get quiet. You have to get space, take a hike in the woods and sit down and just listen to the stream. What is it that when you look back, you are proud that you did? As you look at those things that make you feel alive, ask yourself whether you have taken the leap to make those things your career path, to turn that into what you call “work” that you do every day? It doesn’t have to be what you trade for money, but is it something you get to do every single day?
I know a lot of people who take this precious thing they love, this precious thing that is so miraculous in their life, and they take it and stuff it in a little box and say, “One day I will do that. Someday I will go try it. Someday I will make that happen.” What they don’t realize is, life is short. I was just watching this beautiful video of this man who would carry a poem around that he read and it made him feel alive. He met this human being who wrote the poem and they fell deeply in love, and they went and got married.
And, so many days later, this man just woke up and had a nasty accident, was rushed to hospital and it turns out that he had cancer and was dying. Literally weeks later, he was gone. Wow, to love another human being with your whole heart and soul. There are so many people who have the opportunity to live life and love life that much, and instead of doing so, they hold back.
Could you imagine that man holding back his love for this human being that he just met? Could you imagine that man didn’t give every ounce of his heart and soul to this person, how much regret he would feel? How much frustration he would have? How much that would haunt him for the rest of his life, knowing he could have given this human being all of his soul in the moment that he had the opportunity to but instead he came up with some reason, some fear, some story why he couldn’t, why he was afraid to, why he wasn’t ready? Why now wasn’t the time? Man, I’d hate to live with that kind of regret and frustration in my life!
And the truth is, most people are living with that regret and frustration, and not even knowing it. Deep down inside, they know what they want to do, they know what they were made for and they are just scared to go for it. And I hope you don’t wake one day and discover it is your last day and you go, “Oh shocks, I could have done something about it! I coulda, woulda, shoulda…that was my chance!”
I hope I can speak some urgency into you. I hope I can share some faith with you and say a prayer for you. Hopefully, you can just decide to go for it, make a way, create a way, or design a way. I think the most important resource I was taught when young is resourcefulness, creativity…pouring your love, your passion, your joy and saying, “How can I find a way to make this happen? Who can I partner with to help me get there? What can I do right now to take me one step closer to make this a reality?” And if every day you apply a part of your heart, a part of your soul, you develop your creativity and your ability to delve deep inside, you will find a way to make progress.
And if you don’t let people talk you out of it, if you don’t let yourself get scared and back down, if you don’t let anything really prevent you from giving your all, you will start to make progress. When you talk to people who do what they love, they have a spark about them, they have a special aliveness as they talk about it, there’s a special glow. You can just look at them, and feel you want some of that.
Going back to my experience at the beach in Fiji, the only thing that kept coming to my mind was that I wanted to always make a difference in people’s lives. And the fun part was that I could do it right there. I could make someone smile. I could tell someone they look good today, I could give them a hug. Then I scratched my head and wondered how I could turn that into a business. I’d love to get paid to do something that makes me feel so alive every day! Sharing love, sharing inspiration, sharing strategy and insights to help people be their absolute best in all that they are doing. I felt that would be a very cool thing…to turn into a business, to turn into an opportunity to call a career path. I’m blessed.
People ask me how it feels to follow in my father’s footsteps and I tell them I don’t know because I just sat down, listened and followed my heart to the things that I love doing. My dad and I just happen to love the same things, helping humanity. My mum has the same thing too, so I got it from both sides. It poured into me. I saw the way they connect with people, the way they talk to people, and I loved all that. I decided I wanted that as a career, not like them who went to work and then helped people on the side. I wanted to do it all day long.
I started off in the not-for-profit world, and over time I found a path called coaching which allowed me to help people all day long, giving them 100 percent of my focus. I have a list of twenty people I work with at any time to be happier, stronger, feel more fulfilled, have better relationships, get stronger, grow their businesses, and so on. All I get to do is help people, and I call that work!
I don’t know what it is for you. Are you doing what you love? All I ask is that you get time to write each day, get time to listen to what it is that calls to you, whatever it is that you feel drawn towards and do something about it. Don’t wait 10 years until you make enough money. People say they will travel someday, then they work and work until they are so exhausted from all those years of working that they don’t have the life to travel. Make it a point and just go for it. Today is the day, just make the decision.
What can you do to be more aligned with your passion, the things that call to you and make you feel more alive? What can you do today to be 10 percent closer to those things? You don’t necessarily have to do it in exchange for money, you can earn money doing tons of other things, but engage with your passion every day.
I like meeting and interacting with people, and recently I met this guy who is in real estate. He was talking lifelessly about how many properties he had sold and I asked him what his passion was. He told me he was at an event recently and was blown away by the energetic healing which took place within him. As a result, he was taking a group of people to the pyramids in Egypt, and he was so animated while talking about it. I was like, that’s cool! Your real estate stuff sounds so boring as you talk about how many billions’ worth of property you have sold.
It is amazing to listen when someone taps into that level of aliveness while talking about what they do. I hope that you, too, get to tap into that same level of aliveness. My challenge to you from today’s topic is; what career do you love? Write down everything you love. Write down the things you are good at. Write down what the world needs more of right now, and then write down what the world is willing to pay for. When you combine those four things, you will see some magic happen. You might see an opportunity that calls to you, that you can get paid for what you love.
Mine is coaching, and that’s why we created Performance Coach University to give people the opportunity that if they love helping people they can join us and get certified in how to be a coach. I want that opportunity to become available (something I have been doing for sixteen years now) to other amazing human beings. There’s so many options, but please, make the decision today so that when you look back twenty years from now, you will be please to say that’s the day I made the decision to finally start doing what I love every day, that I finally started living true to my calling, that I finally started going for it.
Please, make today that day. Make this moment count. Make the decision right now and literally write it down that from now on, this is what I am going to do. Find a way to make it happen, find a way to make it real. I hope this day’s lesson helps!
To Your Success,
Jairek Robbins