You Are The Ultimate Authority On Your Life And Career: Here's How To Own It

Do you seek out help with your life’s challenges? Perhaps you seek out career or business mentors? Or devour personal development tools to help you navigate your work and/or life problems - the latest self-help books, podcasts, classes, courses etc.?

If so, that’s fantastic. Taking in advice, teachings, and guidance from others can help us learn, and reach our personal and professional goals. But, as I have experienced myself and seen in others, we can take things too far. We can begin to subtly abdicate our own authority over our life, career and business decisions to these external influences.

When you do this, you set yourself up to feel as though you need the input of others to be able to navigate your decisions, you can find yourself exhausted constantly searching for answers outside of yourself, and you run the risk of not making the best decisions for you. In listening so closely to others you can subjugate your intuition and inner knowing and make decisions that you wouldn't otherwise and don’t serve you.

What we’re doing in looking for help is looking for guidance on the right path to take, but there is really no “right” path other than the right path for you. And only you have access to what that is for you. You are the ultimate authority - on your life, on your career, or on your business.

The guidance of others can be extremely valuable, but amongst the sea of input, your own voice, your viewpoint, how you think and feel is going to be the best resource in arriving at decisions and/or finding the path that is right for you. Perhaps one of the most important skills in life is to learn to sift through all external instruction, deeply listen to you and arrive at your own conclusions.

To begin to honor yourself as the ultimate authority, you will need to do begin to shift the way you move through the world. Here are some pointers on how to take back your power.

Develop deep trust in your own ability to make decisions. Trust your own wisdom.

We are habitually oriented around what others imply or instruct us to do. Many of us, for much our lives, have followed a lot of external instruction - often a lot of “shoulds” - to get us where we are now. So it’s become second nature to be more externally than internally referenced and look to others to help us find our way.

So, part of this is habit. But, we also tend to feel safer when we are following directions. We often don’t trust our own judgments and it feels safer to follow something outside of us. We can find ourselves mentally referencing the directives of those we have made into an authority to help us navigate our decisions and we feel safer when we follow their instructions.

To not have an external authority give us direction can feel scary and disorienting. And we can have the fear accompanied realization that we are alone in our decision making. However, there are two things to keep in mind:

First, see how listening to external instruction and ignoring our your inner voice, has often resulted in things not working out the way you had hoped.

Have you ever taken advice from someone, be it a mentor, business consultant or maybe even a personal development figure you follow, that didn’t really seem right to you at the time, but you figured they knew best? Only to later have things not work out the way you had hoped and find your inner voice was right all along?

I’m sure you can think of many times you took the direction of others - perhaps listened to societal “shoulds” or followed what others were telling you was the “right” thing - when at the same time you had a questioning inner voice. And perhaps you found yourself in a situation you don’t want to be in.

What we think is the “safe” and “right” path, if we’re not deeply listening to ourselves and valuing our own judgment, can take us astray.  And these instances are strong evidence that you do know what to do, you actually have a lot of inner wisdom about what’s right for you. You just need to listen to and trust it more.

Second, see how it’s really been you navigating your life all along.

Not having another voice to instruct you can make you feel alone. But in reality, see how you were always standing on your own in your life anyway. The others that you have been looking to for guidance are not in and living your life. They’ve given you some pointers, but ultimately it’s always only been you in the nitty-gritty navigating your way. You really do have all you need inside of you. And arguably, when you really own this and value your own judgment more, making better decisions for you, you’ll thrive. The shift to make is really one if perception; that you need the external guidance. You really don’t. Step into your power.

Get over the imposter syndrome of being in charge of our own life (!)

In the absence of external instruction, we can feel some form of imposter syndrome over being in charge of our own life (!) . We might think to ourselves, “Who am I to make these decisions? I don’t know what I’m doing.”

But the real question to ask is, “Who is someone else to make these decisions for me?” How is it possible they have more access to the decision/path that is right for me?”

Those you are looking to guide you might have a bit more experience than you in navigating the steps you also want to take, but their way is just one of many, so their advice is really just a data point, a suggestion for you to take in. And it’s my experience that the more you look behind the curtain of those you are making into an authority figure you’ll see that everyone is just human with imperfect information and we’re all trying our best to make sense of the world and navigate our way through life. You really are an equal with just as valuable insights as those you are looking to for help.

No one has THE answer. No one can say their way is the only way or the way that will result in what you want with any certainty. There are so many potentials, so many possible paths to the outcome you want. And the truth is that your best chance at getting it is likely listening to you.

Additional reminders to help you step into your own authority:

Get clarity on your fears - What’s the worst thing that can happen by listening to yourself? See how it may be unlikely to happen and if it did you would be able to handle it.

Practice working with the information you have and stop the analysis paralysis - The only thing you can do is moment-to-moment listen to what you want to do given the set of information available to you right now. You don’t need to constantly chase down more information and engage in overanalysis. Practice trusting your judgments and trust that whatever results from your decision you will also be able to navigate calmly in the same way.

If you do seek help, find those who will help you find your own answers - Be wary of those who wish to prescribe with self-righteousness or conviction. Seek out those who will help you sort through the external inputs and find your truth. Personally, as a career coach, this is how I see my role.

Keep the external voices in their place - Watch your mind and become more conscious of when you are referencing the input of another to help you make decisions. It’s fine to take that input in, but focus on what feels right to you. At the very least, hold your own voice an equal amongst the others.

See how exciting it can be to listen to you - While I get that it’s can be scary to just listen to you, it can also be extremely exhilarating. Pause for a minute and feel into just how nice it would be to not have to constantly scan your mind for external directives of what to do, how to think and how to solve your problems. True freedom.

The Life You Want Is Waiting - But There's A Catch: You Have To Be Willing To Be You

You can have everything you want for your life. But here’s the catch: you have to be willing to be your authentic self. How do you expect to create a life in alignment with you, to experience fulfillment, ease and joy in your days, if you’re not showing up as and honoring who you really are?

This seems like a simple and obvious observation, and yet so many of us find ourselves in a life that is completely different from what we want to experience. In a life that we thought had us on the right track but feels completely different from how we thought it would.

And there is a simple and obvious observation to explain this too. Who you are and your true desires have never appeared all that relevant. From the time we are children, there is a tremendous amount of instruction, collective conditioning from caregivers and society, telling us to “be this way, not that way.” Some is necessary socialization, but the underlying message we are taught over and over again in various ways is that we must be a certain way to be safe - to be good enough, lovable, worthy. In the quest for these things - which we feel as the quest for our survival - we abandoned our true self. He/She is felt as a hindrance and in the way.

This occurs in all areas of life. Anytime you’re not being your true authentic self, there’s an underlying mental storyline that you can’t be. That you need to be a chameleon and forsake yourself to survive - to fit in and be accepted, to be enough, to be loved...and - what I want to talk about here - to be “successful.”

In our professional lives, the quest for survival translates into the unexamined quest for “success.” We’re taught “successful” - defined as having money, prestige, status, etc. - is what we need to be. Being “successful” is how we will prove we’re “good enough” and feel “safe.” To be “successful” is the underlying motivation behind what we do. And when this - when your fear of not being “good enough,” your deep grasp and need to be “successful” - is making your life choices for you, choices that take you away from your true self, the fulfillment and experience of life you’re really after is not possible.

Instead of experiencing alignment and fulfillment, we enter the land of compromises and convincing ourselves we like what we do because we don’t feel there are any other options, or because we’ve so innocently lost ourselves, we don’t know what else we would do instead. We find ourselves creating a life that looks good on paper while bulldozing any chance of real fulfillment and happiness.

So, how can we unravel ourselves from this? By unraveling and letting go of the identity we have contorted ourselves into and held up in the name of survival. Become aware of where and how you’re holding up a life - perhaps a job and professional identity - that isn’t in alignment with your true self. I’m sure you’re aware of where this is happening for you because you’re aware of all the effort you’re putting in. It’s exhausting. It takes a huge amount of effort to try to be someone deep down we’re not. Perhaps you’re realizing just how unsustainable all this effort is. With awareness of where that effort is coming from - the belief you need to keep doing what you’re doing to survive - you can look more closely and see that this isn’t actually true.

In fact, it’s the other way around. Instead of abandoning yourself, the only way to survive here, and not only that, but to thrive, experience fulfillment, and experience the life you are seeking, is to commit to being and honoring yourself. When you envision the life you want, where you’re happy, experiencing fulfillment, peace, joy, etc. does it make sense that you can create and experience that life while disowning your authentic self?

To come into the embodiment of who you truly are will also require an examination of the narrative driving you. The one that has you reaching for externally defined markers of “success” as a way to prove your worth and feel “safe.” This narrative unravels quickly if you come to realize that you are already inherently good enough. Despite what your ego is telling you, there is no external worldly condition that can touch your worth. There is nothing you can point to that can change just how significant, perfect and essential you are here.

In practice, while you may intellectually understand all this, it’s another thing to actually do it. To really listen to yourself and follow your truth can feel very scary. You’re pushing up against a lifetime of conditioning that says being who you really are and following what you truly want is not a viable option. That it’s not safe. The pain created by this conditioning needs to be touched with tenderness and love. And the more you take steps - even the smallest baby steps - to honor yourself and your true desires, over time you will see and experience that you actually are safe. You can be here as your true self and experience the fulfillment and thriving you’re after. Again, it's actually the only way to.

How To Walk Yourself Through A Career Change - When You Don't Know What's Next

When you are tired enough there will come a moment. You can’t keep doing what you’re doing. Something must change. You don’t yet know what this change will look like, but your fear of taking a step into the unknown has now been surpassed by the pain of remaining stuck in the current situation. There is now still lots of fear, but also a willingness to finally look deeper into yourself and find your way. There isn’t really any other option - this just isn’t sustainable any longer.

So, what’s next? How do you find your way to work, a career, a life you actually enjoy - one that fills your cup rather than depletes it?

It’s a process. One that I’ve walked myself and I walk others through in my career coaching practice. I thought it would be helpful to articulate some of the thoughts, feelings, and inner experiences that often come when one is on the path. In our society, we tend to keep our cards close and only let in those closest to us, so you may feel you’re the only one going through this. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. It’s my hope that if you’re in this transition phase where you have found your No - what you don’t want to do - but not yet sure of a true, authentic Yes - may you take solace in finding resonance in my words and know it’s all ok, completely fine and part of the process. You’re in it and on your way.

Relief

When I finally admitted to myself I didn’t want to stay on the path I was on, while there were of course a million other emotions, I also remember a huge sense of relief. When you finally admit to yourself what’s true for you, there is relief that you no longer have to try to fit yourself into the situation, push yourself to figure it out and find a way to make it work. There is relief in acceptance of where you’re at and in resolving to now take steps to do something other than continue to abuse your soul. This feeling of relief - of a deep exhale - can be a helpful pointer to orient yourself as you move forward. Your Yes will feel like this - an honoring of you that feels right, despite the white noise.

Resistance

You’re very familiar with resistance. It’s what’s kept you in this job so long, long after you realized you don’t like it. Resistance sounds like “shoulds,” like comparisons and internalized judgments of others and what it will mean if you do something different, like arguments about “safe” paths and sunk costs. Even though you’ve reached a point where you’re willing to make changes, it’s still there. See resistance for what it is: fear-based commentaries from your mind that keep you paralyzed. They’re just thoughts; and they aren’t necessarily true. Most of the time they’re not, but either way these thoughts aren’t serving you, your freedom or happiness. Get curious about what they’re telling you and question if they actually have your best interest in mind.

Loss and grieving

No one is literally dying, but in a sense yes, something is - the identity you built for yourself around your current career. And the projected future you had for yourself on that path. You may ask yourself, “Was all that effort and pain to get where I am now for nothing?” You’re now going through a process of grieving that old self and giving birth to a new one. You aren’t actually becoming a new person though; instead, it’s a process of coming into who you truly are. You’re honoring who you have been all along and shedding a false self that propped up the life that is no longer serving you.

Fear

Fear is a common thread throughout the whole process. It won’t go away, but we can learn to identify it, and not let it control us. If you look closely, letting fear drive the bus is likely partly to blame for finding yourself in the current situation, in work and a life you don’t like. The big fear is for the future - you don’t know what the future will hold. We want to know and it’s very uncomfortable to be in this limbo space. We want to know what we want and what we’re going to do next, and that we will be successful at it. And then we will feel safe. I assure you that right now, the safest thing you can do is not listen to fear (if you really are in true immediate danger you'll know). Listen to you, to what your heart is telling you is true for you, to your authentic desires. You may have the thought, “How will I survive if I am true to myself?” But, it’s actually the only way. Denying your self, your needs, your desires is where the danger is.

Loneliness

You may feel you're the only one going through this. Others may seem to be marching on with their happy lives and you feel yours is falling apart. You may feel misunderstood by your peers or family. Remember that the work of finding your authentic self is a journey everyone must go through, eventually, or suffer the consequences. Now or later each of us finds ourselves at a breaking point from which a willingness to embark on the journey emerges. You are not alone, everyone is going to walk this path at some point. Your time just happens to be now, while others around you may have a later start.

Here are some pointers to find your way:

Get clear on your definition of success

Part of our pain can be around wanting to be “successful.” We thought the current path would lead to success and whether it has or not, we now find ourselves needing to walk away. This is interesting and points to the need for a little introspection and more conscious choices. What is it that you really want for yourself? What truly matters to you to have a life fully lived? What is success on your terms?

Follow what feels good

Get out of your mind and it’s chatter and into your body. Have an idea for a possible new career direction? Try it on in your body. Visualize yourself in this new life and pay attention to how your physical body feels. This is your intuition speaking and it tells the truth. If there is a feeling of ease, excitement, joy etc. you’re likely on the right path.

Aim for intrinsic enjoyment

Whatever you do next, there needs to be some genuine intrinsic enjoyment in the work. Otherwise, it’s just not sustainable and we have to ask ourselves why on earth we’re doing it. We are often convinced by our mind to do things because we think we’re going to get something - status, lots of money, adoration, approval - and we think that something will make us happy. But it rarely does. So, go directly to what does, what lights you up, what you are excited to get up and do every day for the sake of it, because you want to.

Get still and get rest

Stillness is where you access clarity. Give yourself space and time to be with you, to listen to all that he/she has to say that for years now has been pushed aside. It’s also likely that he/she is tired; deeply exhausted from holding everything together for so long, and exhausted from trying so hard to figure everything out. First trying to figure out how to contort yourself to make your current situation work, and now what on earth is going to happen next. Stop trying so hard. Give yourself permission to rest and clarity will come through. Creativity, access to your truth, new ideas and inspiration cannot come from a weary soul.

Leaving Your Employer And Worried About 'Burning A Bridge'? Here's Some Advice To Calm Your Nerves

Telling our employer we’re leaving them can feel stressful. Even if we’re at peace with our decision to leave, many of us are afraid of conflict and can dread having this conversation. We hope our employer will understand and everything will go smoothly, but we never really know how they’ll respond. Here are a few things to think about as you go into this interaction. They may seem like basic pointers, but when anxiety is running high we can forget the simplest things that can go a long way to reduce the potential for tension these conversations have.

Start by simply thinking through your departure from your employer/boss’s perspective. What could upset them or “burn a bridge”?

First, think through your leaving from a business perspective.

One of the top concerns an employer often has when an employee is leaving is how they will keep the business running smoothly. They hired you to perform a function and carry a workload and there's the potential for stress - they will be scrambling to fill the gap - if your news leaves them hanging.

Ask yourself, "How can I help make my leaving less of a headache for my boss/employer?" If you can, be strategic in your timing and thoughtful of the workflow considerations. Maybe there is a break between client assignments when the timing would be better. Maybe you can offer more than the standard two weeks notice while they find a replacement. Or offer your willingness to help train or transition your work to another employee. I understand this might not be possible in all cases - you might just need to leave ASAP - but anything that can lessen the shock of the news and help your employer out can go a long way to create a graceful exit.

Second, think through your leaving from a human perspective.

If not “burning a bridge” is a concern, the way you communicate your decision to leave is going to be key. Whatever you say, think about how it may be received on the other side - ask yourself, “How would I feel if I were in my boss's position hearing an employee say this?” Remember, they are human with feelings and egos. And they are continuing to invest their time and energy in your current company.

Tread lightly in saying anything that could be perceived as criticism or that you're leaving for greener pastures. If you are going to enter into a discussion about what you’re planning on doing next, frame it around you and the things you want to pursue, not what your employer is lacking. A general guideline is to think about using “I” statements instead of “you” statements, which can come across as blaming or critical. For example, “I want to expand my experience in ___” rather than, “You don’t provide enough opportunities for me to do ___.” See the difference?

If it's that you want to explore a different career path - something completely different that your employer could never offer - you could simply share this with them. It's unlikely they would take this personally. It's quite different than having to tactfully explain you are switching to a competitor firm.

If you are moving to a competitor firm, this is where things can obviously get tricky. Here, it can help to be specific about what is different about the opportunity – remember not better, just different – that aligns more with you and your specific goals. Maybe they offered you a chance to build a new business line, or cover a territory that is already covered at your firm. These things can help your boss/employer understand your decision to leave and that you are not directly critiquing their firm, but going to a place where there is a better fit or opportunities for you.

Have grace and gratitude

Lastly, make sure to be gracious, and express gratitude for your time at your current company. Even if this job has never been what you really want to do, or for whatever reason, you can’t stand working there anymore - don’t share this with them. Instead, thank and express appreciation to your employer for the opportunities they have provided (even if it’s only to show you want you don’t want).

Examine your fears

Remember, it's ultimately out of your control how they will take your news. You can do what you can to help things go smoothly, but keep in the back of your mind that at the end of the day you're not in control or responsible for their response. Try to confront your fears head on and ask yourself, “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” Let’s say they do get really upset. Then what? Likely not much. Over time when things have cooled off, your relationship may recover. Or you might end up “burning a bridge,” but life moves on and in the big picture it likely won’t matter as much as you think it does right now.

See this as an opportunity for learning and personal growth

I also find it helpful to think about how many successful people have likely burned some bridges along their career journey. If you're going to speak up for yourself, honor you and do what you need to do to create the life you want, you’ll have to learn to be ok with others sometimes getting upset with you. Take this as an exercise in standing in your own power.

Does Wanting To Be 'Good Enough' Drive You and Your Career Choices?

A large source of traffic to my website is from people Googling some variation of “I don’t feel good enough.” I wrote a blog post about never feeling good enough a couple of years ago that seems to get a lot of clicks from Google search results. In the post, I share about my own journey with trying to prove I’m "good enough" through professional accomplishments and what I've learned. That it gets so many reads has been interesting to observe and points to how many people struggle with feeling like they are enough.

While it may manifest and impact people in different ways, perhaps my experience of it and the way it interfered with - controlled - my life is relatable to some. And in the path I took to free myself from constant proving there may be some helpful pointers for those also wondering if they will ever get “there” and feel enough.

To be “good enough” as the underlying motivation of your career choices

In the past, everything in my life - especially professionally/career-wise - was motivated by a desire to prove or achieve being enough. There was very little that I did that came from any genuine wanting to do it. Everything I did, I did because I thought I “should” - it would give me a stamp of approval, allow me to fit in, meet expectations, be worthy of love (the last one being what I think our desire to be enough is really about).

I found any sense of being enough which a professional achievement brought was fleeting as the next thing to work toward came into focus; there was no rest, no finish line. And while I wasn't able to articulate why at the time, I always felt that no accomplishment ever deep down really made me feel enough. Because, to approach being enough as something to be earned - predicated on me getting it “right” - felt precarious. This all led to tremendous anxiety as I tried to control the world and myself to produce only the acceptable outcomes. It was exhausting, laborsome and ultimately unsustainable.

Eventually, my body collapsed from all the stress of constant pushing and striving. I developed a physical illness that forced me to stop everything. It was then that I took the time to examine what was really motivating me. And when I unpacked this ever-present feeling of "I'm not good enough" I could see clearly for the first time how just how untrue and destructive it is. Much could be said, but a few realizations that I think are worth sharing shifted my thinking.

Examining the concept of “good enough”

First, when asking myself what good enough even means I couldn’t come up with a strong answer. How do you define “good enough”? Good enough to whom? For what? In what context? When you really ask these questions to yourself the concept completely falls apart. It’s even slightly funny to think how much our lives can be entirely fixated on achieving something we can’t really put our finger on; and on getting somewhere, “arriving” someplace that doesn’t really exist.

Second, because it is so nebulous and impossible to pin on anything - any external circumstance or situation that would provide a seal of “being enough” - it follows that our worth must be inherent in our very existence. This I now believe to be the truth. You are and have always been enough, just as you are. To believe otherwise, you will spend your life working to achieve things that, if you’re like me, you don’t even really care about other than for their utility in signaling your worth to the world.

Where did this idea of needing to prove you are “good enough” come from?

If our worth is inherent, I then have to wonder why it took me so many years to know this. Why did I ever believe and feel it was something to be earned and proven through my endeavors? Where did this belief come from? And why do I still at times feel this way even now when I know it’s not true?

Well, I’ll just say that this is where my liberal arts degree background could write an essay talking about social, political and economic structures. I won’t now, but I think you can see where I’m going with this. The thing to consider is that the belief that external conditions dictate our value has come from these constructs. And like other beliefs that are instilled by our collective societal conditioning, such as, for example, that money will equal happiness, they fail to be true, sending us on a fool’s errand. And they fail to come close to touching on the actual truth of what is nourishing to a human life.

The freedom to discover what you genuinely want to do

The realization that I am - we all are - already enough was pivotal in helping me make changes in my career and move into work that I actually enjoy. Once we see that we don’t need to try to prove our worth through our work, our future is no longer dictated by shoulds and all the things we have laid out before us as our path to being enough. The space opens up for us to value what we actually want and have a genuine desire to do for work. What we actually enjoy doing can come to the forefront, no longer taking the place of a distant secondary concern.

So, how do you find what you genuinely want to do?

For some, perhaps they’ve known for a long time and hidden a secret desire to do a particular thing. This was not me. I had no clue. Because frankly, it never mattered what I wanted. All that mattered was what I should do to be enough. So, my inner workings and what lit me up inside were unexamined. And for a long time after freeing myself from the grip of needing to prove myself, while I very much (almost desperately and frantically) wanted to know what I really wanted to do for work, it remained unknown.

As I then learned, no one in my position uncovers their heart's desire and passion overnight. It unfolds as you start to unravel the scaffolding that you've built around yourself and mistook for the real you. It’s revealed over time as you peel back the layers upon layers of beliefs held about who you are, who you think you should be and what’s possible for you. Slowly, you begin to find the smallest, faintest spark of the authentic you, authentic enjoyment and desire. This is some of the kind of work I do with my career coaching clients. You’re dissolving down your former identity, the one oriented around proving your worth, and finding yourself.  It’s a process. And I’ll admit the process isn’t necessarily easy to navigate, but I’ve found it's very much worth it.

Don't Know If You Can Trust Yourself In Deciding Your Next Career Step? You Can If You Do This

Recently, I’ve had a few career coaching clients ask me some variation of, "How can I trust myself? I've taken steps in my career that I thought were the right thing and now things aren’t working out. So, how can I trust my judgment in deciding what I do next?”

My answer is we can trust ourselves and our judgment to the extent that we’re willing to be really honest with ourselves.

The thing is, you can never know for sure how something is going to go, we’re just working with the information we have in the moment. However - and this is where we can run into trouble - often we don’t really use all the information available to us. In particular, we don't look at or we downplay how we’re actually feeling deep down about things. What’s going on inside of us is a wealth of information we can have the tendency to ignore, sometimes knowingly.

So how do you trust yourself in deciding on your next career step? You make sure you’re looking at that stuff going on inside. I’m talking about getting really honest about the potential thing you’re considering doing and whether you genuinely feel it’s what you want. Just how in a relationship with another person, you can trust them to the extent they are honest with you, you can only really trust yourself to the extent you are honest with yourself.

For me in the past, just like my clients, I also made decisions I thought were the “right” move, but they didn’t work out as I’d hoped. What I was doing was actively convincing myself - telling myself a story about how it was the right thing and hiding what I knew deep down to be true. I was pretending that there wasn’t a small voice inside me whispering, “Actually no, you don’t really want to do this.” I didn’t want to acknowledge it and was scared to admit it was there. Because then I would have to deal with it.

Our truth can often seem pretty inconvenient and troublesome; so we’d rather pretend it’s not there.  For me, facing my truth would mean I’d have to then do the work of finding what I actually do want to do. At the time I felt lost and like I hadn’t a clue what that was. But I did know it was likely something that didn’t fit the script of what myself and others had created for my future. I was afraid to be honest about and confront that. So I pushed that inner voice aside and tried my best to convince myself the path I was about to walk was the “right” one and that I actually wanted it.

I think you know how that worked out. We can’t hide from ourselves. There’s no getting around your truth. In this moment, your truth could be that despite all the arguments for it, you don’t actually want to do what you’re considering doing next. Your truth could be that you don’t really know what you want to do, but instead of doing the inner work to find out, you’re trying to convince yourself you want to do X - you’re not being honest with yourself. Whatever your honest truth is, it’s what you can trust. And it’s perhaps the most valuable piece of information to guide your next step. Any step that honors that truth will put you on solid ground.

So, how do you know if you’re being honest with yourself? Well, if what you’re considering doing is right for you, you likely won't need to convince yourself. You’ll know. You’ll feel it. And while you may have fear, you’ll also feel excited to take this next step because there’s some real desire there. It’s not coming from shoulds or a convincing mind with arguments. Notice the difference between something sounding good - maybe looking really good on paper, feeding your ego, ticking all the boxes, having arguments for being a “safe” choice - vs. something that actually in your bones feels good, gets you excited and has some real energy behind it.  Get clear and honest with yourself on your motivations - are you motivated by a genuine desire to do what you’re considering doing? Or is it coming from a place of shoulds and a need for external validation?

Think about other areas of life, like relationships. Have you ever started a relationship with someone and early on had some red flags that you chose to ignore? Perhaps you did a bunch of convincing yourself that they weren’t a big deal. Maybe because you were afraid of being alone, facing the judgment of others, bearing the pain of ending the relationship, or any number of other reasons. In the end, these relationships usually don’t work out and you’re left wondering why when deep down you kinda already know why. You knew all along it wasn't really the right fit. What I’m talking about here for your career navigation is a very similar thing.

Pay attention to how you’re really feeling. If you do that, you can take your next career step knowing you’re doing the best you can and it’s likely your future self will thank you. There are still no guarantees things will go exactly as you hope, but you will have done your part.

How To Identify And Stand Up For Your Work-Home Boundaries

Let’s say a request is made of us that would mean we will have to work late that night. Instead of finding a way to say what we may be feeling inside - “Actually no, I can’t do that with the other projects on my plate,” or asking, “Can I have more time to complete this task?” we stay silent. Then we feel stressed and a whole range of emotions rise up inside of us as we stay up late and meet the request. Sound familiar? I think we’ve all experienced something like this at some point.

Not listening to ourselves and not speaking up for our boundaries can create a lot of stress. So, it’s worth taking a look and learning how to tune in and identify what your boundaries are and how to communicate them. I appreciate it may not be possible to voice your boundary and ask for what you want/need in all situations, but there are likely several instances you haven’t been speaking up where you could.

Personally, I think identifying and speaking up for your boundaries is a skill you learn and can get better at over time. In the past, there was a time when I struggled with this. Requests were asked of me and it didn’t even register that I had an option to say ‘No’ or communicate my own perspective or needs. I was aware I was stressed by the ask, but didn’t know how to navigate communicating my needs and possibly finding more of a win-win situation.

It’s been a process to learn more about boundaries, what mine are and how to communicate them. Here I’ll share some of what I’ve learned and what I share with my clients as a career coach. Something to note; when I refer to work-home boundaries, I don’t literally mean your home. I simply mean boundaries that separate work from the rest of your life - personal relationships, hobbies/interests, family time, personal time etc.

Why we need to speak up for our work-home boundaries

Honoring our boundaries is how we create a life that feels good to us and is in alignment with how we each want to live. Identifying and establishing our work-home boundaries is how we preserve and support our mental and physical health, foster our relationships, reach our goals and fulfill our desires in areas outside of work.

Our culture would have us believe that our needs for rest, play and enjoyment, personal relationships etc. should come second to our work productivity. There is a popular notion that the harder we work, the more dedicated we are to our work, the better our life will be. This is the kind of thinking that has us second guessing, denying and staying silent on our boundaries. But when we live this way, denying our needs and placing work above all else, we suffer. Despite the messages we may be receiving from society, this isn’t actually supportive for us if we want to create a fulfilled and healthy life. When we’re tuned into ourselves and standing up for our boundaries around work and home we create the space for us to flourish in all areas of life. And this even includes career success - we thrive at work and are able to put our best foot forward when the rest of our life is in balance and nourishing us. Strong ideas, creativity and excellent work come from a nourished soul.

Boundaries are unique to you - so you have to communicate them to others

Your boundaries are your boundaries - they’re up to you. They come from what feels right for you, what you want and are ok with and what you don’t want and are not ok with. It’s going to be different for each person. So if you tend to compare your boundaries to others, you really don't need to. It's ok to feel the way you feel and need what you need.

But, because they are so unique to each of us, this means we need to be experts at communicating them! Others aren’t mind-readers and when they make a request of us often don’t even know if they are crossing a boundary for us or not. This is key to remember.

It seems we want others to somehow implicitly know where our boundaries are and respect them (and can get angry when they’re crossed), but also don’t want to do what’s required to communicate them and stand up for them. This isn't logical. But I understand why we think this way - speaking up for ourselves isn’t easy and we’d rather not have to. So when someone puts us in a position where we are forced to, we get stressed. Speaking up, while often worth it to get what you need, in the moment can feel just as stressful as not speaking up.

Why we struggle to set boundaries

Setting boundaries that involve expressing them to other people can be challenging. Often we are afraid to assert our boundaries as there are fears of causing conflict that could result in upsetting or disappointing/inconveniencing someone or being rejected, criticized, judged etc. We want to maintain peace and avoid conflict. But while there may be peace on the outside, keeping the peace is not peaceful to us on the inside. We end up having to suppress that little voice inside that’s saying, “This is not ok.” And over time this takes a toll on us.

Getting more awareness of your boundaries

Sometimes you are fully aware of what boundary for you is being crossed. Other times there’s less specific awareness, but awareness nonetheless. When a request is made or an expectation is set for you to do something and you feel a twinge inside - perhaps a pressure in your chest or some other stress response - that is your body communicating to you that you’re not fully on board with the ask. Your body often knows before your mind is consciously aware of what’s not ok and what the boundary is for you that’s being tested. It’s important to tune into yourself and listen when this happens.

Identify what you need. Reflect for a moment and ask yourself, do you need to say ‘No’ to the request? Or ask for some part of it to change? What do you need instead for you to feel better about it? What outcome would allow that stress response to relax?

Then, ask yourself if there is a way to communicate this need in a clear and calm way. In the moment you may be feeling the anger I referred to earlier, but the more you convey your ask in a calm, professional manner the better the chances of a positive response. Again, it may not be possible to voice your boundary/need in each and every situation, but pay attention to where you can. You’ve likely been missing a lot of potential opportunities.

Personally, I was shying away from asking for what I needed not because it was inappropriate to ask, but because of my own fears of “conflict” or “causing trouble” or my fear that others would judge me in some way. And there wasn’t much truth to these fears.

So, take a close look at where and why you have been shying away from speaking up for yourself. What do you fear will happen if you do? Examine the fear. Remember that many fears aren’t grounded in reality and there may be little to no evidence for what you fear actually happening. And the more practice you get in confronting the fear and discovering it’s safe to speak up, the more comfortable you’ll get doing it. Like I said, it’s a skill to develop.

Some signs you might need to start establishing more work-home boundaries

1. You feel like you don't have any space to breathe during the week

If you feel you have to wait until the weekend or your next day off to have any personal time and space to breathe and connect with yourself you might need to look at your boundaries. It doesn't have to be this way if you decide to make changes and claim some time for you. You may not feel like it and this may feel harsh to read, but you are in control of your life. It’s up to you to ask for or take what you need. And if meeting those needs is just not possible in this job, you have the option of moving to a different one. If you continue in this way longer term you may experience some of the other points on this list.

2. You struggle to maintain your relationships

Relationships require you to not only invest time to be with others, but also to be fully present for them. If you are working all the time and physically unavailable or mentally distracted by work when you are with others this will make building and sustaining relationships challenging.

3. You’re starting to burnout

Not honoring your boundaries can contribute to burnout. The obvious signs of burnout are feeling exhausted and losing enjoyment in your work. But burnout can also present in more subtle ways such as being more forgetful, moody/emotional, getting sick more often or engaging more in your particular go-to stress coping mechanisms which aren’t all that healthy (could be eating, alcohol, shopping, over-exercising etc....we all have something).

4. You feel resentful or angry a lot

Anger can actually be helpful in some instances. Anger can come up to tell us we have a boundary that’s being crossed. It’s telling us, ‘This is not ok.” Do a little self inquiry around what your anger might be telling you about a situation. And reflect on what you need to communicate or do to change it. You may then feel fear, but confronting your fears will be worth it to be able to be heard. If you want to feel heard you have to actually speak up.

5. You’re starting to develop health issues

Not having boundaries around work and consequently working or being distracted by work all the time is obviously stressful. It’s well known that stress takes a toll on your both your mental and physical health. You may find yourself developing anxiety or depression or your immune system is suppressed and you’re getting sick more often than usual. Constant stress puts our body in a state of continuous fight-or-flight which can cause a whole range of health issues. What I’ve also observed is when we are too afraid to speak up for boundaries often our body will end up doing it for us. We get sick and voilà we have an excuse, an out or way to express our need and have the boundary drawn. This works, but you don’t want to have to get sick all the time as a way to draw boundaries. Not fun.

6. You can’t turn your brain off of work

If in your “off-time” you’re still always thinking about work this can be a sign you need to set some boundaries. If you genuinely really enjoy thinking about work stuff and it’s not getting in the way of your relationships or other areas of life than it isn’t a necessarily problem. But, if you’re constantly thinking about work because you’re stressed out about it or anxious and worried then this isn’t serving you. You might want to look at how to shift your thoughts and energy off of work so your mind and body get a break and aren’t always “on.” It might mean asking for or putting less on your plate at work, setting expectations around when you are available out of work to check emails, or simply giving yourself the permission to take breaks and turn your focus away from your work.

Have You Changed Jobs, But Still Find Yourself Unhappy? This Might Help

Have you tried different jobs and still can’t find one that feels good? Do you start a new job with optimism and hope for your potential future in the role, but then - either quickly or over time - realize it’s not for you?

I was there. I tried many jobs. I approached each with a genuine desire to be successful and a narrative in my head about how this was a good decision and right for me and my future. But then, for various reasons, things didn’t pan out that way. So, I get you. It’s super frustrating and it can make you feel lost and stuck. And it can trigger all our stuff. It’s different for each person, but we might make our experiences mean there’s something wrong with us, or we’re not good enough, or it could bring up fears that we’ll never be successful or able to create what we want for our lives. It can get very stressful, to say the least.

Struggling to find work you love and will excel at is very common. I see it a lot in my work as a career coach. While sometimes it’s just a case of needing to try out a few things to get a feel for what we like or don’t like before finding the right fit, it can also stem from a different issue; not really knowing yourself.

To find work you love you have to know yourself intimately

To find work you love and will be happy and successful at, you have to know yourself intimately. You have to examine your inner workings and get honest with yourself about what’s important to you, what you like, dislike and your desires for your life. You have to take note of these things and make them a serious priority. Then, it’s a matter of making decisions that truly align with what you want. If you’re not paying close attention to you and what you - a unique individual - finds joy in, likes, dislikes etc., job hopping in the hope that something will happen to be a good fit for you is like taking random stabs in the dark.

We find ourselves in jobs we don’t like because this inner work of developing self-knowledge is largely undervalued in society. The tools to help us do the work aren’t taught in school. And it’s something we have to deliberately turn our attention to and give ourselves the time to focus on. Often, instead of examining our inner world for guidance, our attention to date has been placed elsewhere; we have mostly, if not entirely, been externally referenced for direction on what we should do in our lives and careers.

We’ve come to think safety is in conforming to what the world has taught us we need to be. So, knowing our authentic self isn't prioritized. 

It makes sense. Since birth we’ve been looking to others to tell us what to do for survival. But now we've taken things past learning to look both ways to cross the street or even learning the basics of how to get a job to feed and shelter ourselves. We’ve created powerful narratives about who we need to be and what we need to do or achieve to be “safe.” Finding safety has gone from learning physical survival to anxiously scanning the world for social cues to learn the “right” things to do to be loved, admired, accepted, good enough, “successful”; we’ve come to think safety is in conforming to what the world has taught us we need to be. We’ve come to believe it’s not safe to be our authentic self. And so, our own self-knowledge - knowing our authentic self - isn’t prioritized. All our own likes, dislikes, desires and wants aren’t focused on or paid much attention to. They’ve been made secondary to playing out the script of what we’re supposed to do and be believing that will make us safe.

You'll need to get quiet and deeply listen to you, not fear

I repeat, to find work you love, you’re going to have to get to know yourself. To do that, you’re going to have to put aside all these internalized voices and opinions of others and your beliefs of who you’re supposed to/should be. Then you’ll need to spend some time getting quiet and listening to your soul, your heart, your true self or whatever you like to call the non-ego identified part of you. It holds your truth and all the guidance you need. It’s all inside.

Naturally, there’s going to be huge (huge!) resistance to doing this. Fear is going to come up big time. Your mind is going to scream every fear in the book to try to keep you where you are now, trying to convince you that you need to listen to all the shoulds and external opinions to keep you safe. But if you really take a closer look at those fears, while they may feel really real, many are simply not factually true. And to listen to your heart and your truth is actually a much safer option.

By listening to all the shoulds and believing the fears (for me, I was thinking I needed to have a certain type of job to be “good enough”) I found myself in jobs that look good on paper, but were actually all wrong for me. So, was I safe? No. It resulted in a lot of struggle and exhaustion and ultimately so much stress I developed a serious illness. That’s not safety. So to me, it seems there’s more evidence that looking past the external voices, past the shoulds and fears, then getting acquainted with your true self and listening to him/her is the much safer path. By doing this I’ve found myself in work and work situations that feel good, supportive, easeful, exciting and aligned with who I am. And discovered that safety - to me being "good enough"- is available just the way I am. I am and always was enough.

If I follow my true self, what about money? 

Now, let's real talk for a second about an often unacknowledged elephant in the room - money. If you listen to your heart and change careers, will you have to take a salary cut? Maybe. It depends on what you want to do. But if you do have a pay reduction, consider this; you might not really care. For many, they find that just being able to do what they love is so enriching to their quality of life, health and happiness, the reduced income (within reason) doesn't really matter so much. Also, our potential for being successful financially through our work is often much greater when we are doing something we love and that gets us in our genius zone. So, while there are no guarantees and again it depends on what you want to do, there's the potential for even more financial upside if you decide to make a change - even more so if you're doing something entrepreneurial. Basically, the money stuff is something you're going to have to come to a personal decision on, but it's likely not as black and white as you might be thinking.

Find the freedom to simply be you

Once you put aside the shoulds, fears etc. and embrace who you are, there’s a profound freedom that opens up for you in your life. You get to simply be you. What’s better than that? No job title or approvals from others, bank account balance, level of professional achievement will ever compare to the joy of getting to move through the world authentically yourself.

So, if you find yourself in yet another job that’s just not working out, before jumping to the next, take a pause and spend some time reflecting. One place to start is to look at your motivations, what drives you, and what drives your decision to take a job? Perhaps you have some beliefs that you need to do/be or achieve certain things to be accepted/survive. Examine what comes up for you and the truth of those beliefs. Then ask yourself, what actually brings you, the real you, joy? What would feel amazing to get to spend your days doing? What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail? What would you do even if you weren’t being paid? What lights you up? In the words of poet Mary Oliver, “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Take out a pen and paper and write out what comes up.

Have patience with yourself. Give yourself space to unfold and find your next steps

Know that it’s ok if you don’t have the answers to these questions right away. Many of us have spent a lifetime with our focus outside of ourselves, only paying attention to ourselves as it pertains to trying to get ourselves to fit into a prescribed box. So it naturally may take time to hear your own voice over the noise - to get a signal on your true self and desires and see your true self take shape. Have patience with yourself. Give yourself space to unfold and find your next steps.

Although your mind might be putting pressure on you to hurry up and get to know yourself so you can “figure this out” and be “successful,” that’s more of the same stuff to examine and let go of. The more you do, the better chance you’ll have at not rushing into something and finding yourself in yet another job you don’t want. But also, I’m guessing patience, slowness - space to breathe - is one of your hearts desires if you listen close. And it’s available. There’s really no rush. Your life is for you; for you to live and enjoy on your own terms. And if this resonates, while it’s entirely up to you, may I suggest that living and enjoying life on your own terms, in alignment with who you are and what you want, is your new definition of success.