A641.7.3.RB - Appreciating Your "Real Self"
Thinking through this week’s assignments in the Becoming a Resonant Leader (McKee, 2008) workbook served to reinforce many recurring themes that I’ve been trying to explore deeper the past few weeks. I wouldn’t say there were many surprises along the way, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. During this semester, I’ve really felt like much of the value in these exercises come from patterns: The prompts ask a lot of similar questions but in different ways, which challenge us to dig deeper, and then to acknowledge when the same ideas continue to resurface. That repetition makes us pay closer attention, and then ask ourselves pointed questions — or at least I know it has for me. Taking a more focused look at what I really want out of life, at this particular time, when graduation is just three weeks away, has been powerful. It’s worked to highlight the specific importance of this moment, and of the decisions I make going forward.
For me, many of those recurring themes centered on the idea of intentional change. Beginning this graduate program, for me, was a first step toward true intentionality. I knew that it was time to sort of funnel my ambitions into something tangible, a degree that will hopefully propel me into new job opportunities, but I was unsure what those opportunities might be. I did plenty of exploratory research before entering into my first course, but honestly, much of that was centered on potential income ceilings, and on pinpointing a field that seemed “good enough” of a match with my personality. Once I really dove into coursework, though, I was laser-focused on getting through. I almost didn’t let myself think too far into the future, because my schedule was so demanding. “One thing at a time,” I thought. But now, that’s changed.
Now, I want direction, and not just something “good enough.” I want to move toward a vision of my ideal future, and this week’s exercises help to highlight the values that define that vision.
TAKING STOCK
Activities of greatest worth:
- Quality time with wife
- Conversations with friends/family
- Nights out
- Cooking/enjoying, sharing good food
Activities of greatest worth in job:
- Thinking through the craft of writing a good story
- Seeing it impact the people featured in it
- Making relationships with coworkers
Things I am currently doing in life that I like:
- Achieving a big goal
- Planning a trip
- Strategizing fantasy baseball drafts/trades
- Watching/writing about movies
- Dreaming about the future / figuring out what I really want
- Seeing the progress of paying down debt
What in work do I like?
- Interviewing people
- Crafting stories
Things in life that I don’t like:
- Commuting 45min to work
- Waiting for the next phase to start
- Not taking a definitive steps toward future goals
- Settling, or feeling complacent
Things in work that I don’t like:
- Staring at a computer screen 9 hours a day
- Sticking to a rigid 8-5 routine, in an office
- Planning marketing campaigns / managing social media
I look at this list and notice that the things I tend to like/value are personal, they revolve around relationships, creativity or personal goals/achievement. The things I don’t like are generally tied to things I “have” to do, inefficient things that eat up time (like my commute), or work that does not seem to get me closer to my vision of an idealized future.
The Mindfulness Check-In, next, furthered those points.
MINDFULNESS CHECK-IN
What comes easily to mind is that I can’t wait to be done with school in 3 weeks. The end is so close that it almost doesn’t feel real. The thought of finally having my weekends/free time back is nice, but having that time to fully focus on/explore my next steps (next jobs, city, etc.) is almost more exciting. I don’t want to think about all the work left I have to do. I don’t want to think about going back to work on Tuesday. And I don’t want to think about how the thought of going back to work every Sunday seems depressing. I don’t want to think that I live only for the weekends, but it’s hard sometimes. I want my next job to feel hopeful and like there’s always tangible progress I can see through projects that seem important and interesting. Creativity is a part of that, but I often can’t imagine that reality without also wondering how I could keep up my current pay scale. The “reality” of work/paychecks/stability always seem to get in the way of the hope associated with dreaming about what might be to come.
Pain points: shoulder, neck, back soreness.
Eyes need more restful sleep and less computers.
I’m feeling level and relatively happy today. When I’m stressed or worried, though, I feel the anxiety in my stomach and head. I feel like I can’t focus on much else. To continue feeling happy and engaged, I need to spend time around friends, eat good food, and enjoy my time off, feel like I’m not wasting it. The bigger-picture stress would likely decrease if I knew what, exactly, I was working toward (instead of feeling like I’m simply stuck in the routine of working for a paycheck).
Focus on mountains, which elicits a sense of freedom, leisure, beauty, and gratitude.
In order to fill the Real-Ideal gaps suggested in the previous exercise, I came up with a quick list of things to do/focus on in the future.
SEEKING BALANCE
Body: More exercise / time outdoors
Mind: Proactive career exploration / do better at compartmentalizing time for thinking about work/life’s big goals, and renewing
Emotions: Prioritize social time
Spirit: More time outside, at the beach, on hikes, etc.
MINDFUL CHANGE
After the program, I want to make a few changes. 1) slow down a bit and prioritize renewal / enjoyment of the present / exercise and have more fun, 2) continue to work hard, but make sure that work is in focused pursuit of long-term goals. My degree path was focused, but the endgame was a bit ambiguous. I want to use this experience/degree as a springboard toward a more definitive goal/idealized future.
Making time for things like exercise will help my mind/body. I don’t sleep well, and partly that’s because my mind races and thinks through to-do lists and future plans constantly, but also partially because I never exercise. Slating time most days to “sweat it out” I’m sure would help fight anxiousness and help me sleep deeper.
Getting rid of my commute would also be huge, freeing up a bit of time in the evenings for walks, and a bit of time in the morning, which would let me go to bed later (more renewal on both ends). Getting out from behind a computer all day would also help. I might need to sacrifice cooking some nights in order to exercise and reset my brain.
Mindfulness is about being aware of what’s happening inside of and around us (Boyatzis, p. 112), and looking back on the past few weeks, I absolutely see that the act of mindfulness has slowly become a major emphasis in my day-to-day routine. I’ve become more aware of the sort of nagging desires for my future that have lain dormant, and I’m now ultra-aware that I’ll have an opportunity after finishing this program and receiving my degree to, in a way, reinvent my career.
Those realizations make me feel more awake, and they’ve inspired me to add specific agenda items for change to my schedule — books to buy, information to seek out, structures to form. These exercises are really just a starting point, though. They help us to conceptualize. Next, it will be time to act.
For me, many of those recurring themes centered on the idea of intentional change. Beginning this graduate program, for me, was a first step toward true intentionality. I knew that it was time to sort of funnel my ambitions into something tangible, a degree that will hopefully propel me into new job opportunities, but I was unsure what those opportunities might be. I did plenty of exploratory research before entering into my first course, but honestly, much of that was centered on potential income ceilings, and on pinpointing a field that seemed “good enough” of a match with my personality. Once I really dove into coursework, though, I was laser-focused on getting through. I almost didn’t let myself think too far into the future, because my schedule was so demanding. “One thing at a time,” I thought. But now, that’s changed.
Now, I want direction, and not just something “good enough.” I want to move toward a vision of my ideal future, and this week’s exercises help to highlight the values that define that vision.
TAKING STOCK
Activities of greatest worth:
- Quality time with wife
- Conversations with friends/family
- Nights out
- Cooking/enjoying, sharing good food
Activities of greatest worth in job:
- Thinking through the craft of writing a good story
- Seeing it impact the people featured in it
- Making relationships with coworkers
Things I am currently doing in life that I like:
- Achieving a big goal
- Planning a trip
- Strategizing fantasy baseball drafts/trades
- Watching/writing about movies
- Dreaming about the future / figuring out what I really want
- Seeing the progress of paying down debt
What in work do I like?
- Interviewing people
- Crafting stories
Things in life that I don’t like:
- Commuting 45min to work
- Waiting for the next phase to start
- Not taking a definitive steps toward future goals
- Settling, or feeling complacent
Things in work that I don’t like:
- Staring at a computer screen 9 hours a day
- Sticking to a rigid 8-5 routine, in an office
- Planning marketing campaigns / managing social media
I look at this list and notice that the things I tend to like/value are personal, they revolve around relationships, creativity or personal goals/achievement. The things I don’t like are generally tied to things I “have” to do, inefficient things that eat up time (like my commute), or work that does not seem to get me closer to my vision of an idealized future.
The Mindfulness Check-In, next, furthered those points.
MINDFULNESS CHECK-IN
Mind
What comes easily to mind is that I can’t wait to be done with school in 3 weeks. The end is so close that it almost doesn’t feel real. The thought of finally having my weekends/free time back is nice, but having that time to fully focus on/explore my next steps (next jobs, city, etc.) is almost more exciting. I don’t want to think about all the work left I have to do. I don’t want to think about going back to work on Tuesday. And I don’t want to think about how the thought of going back to work every Sunday seems depressing. I don’t want to think that I live only for the weekends, but it’s hard sometimes. I want my next job to feel hopeful and like there’s always tangible progress I can see through projects that seem important and interesting. Creativity is a part of that, but I often can’t imagine that reality without also wondering how I could keep up my current pay scale. The “reality” of work/paychecks/stability always seem to get in the way of the hope associated with dreaming about what might be to come.
Body
Pain points: shoulder, neck, back soreness.
Eyes need more restful sleep and less computers.
Emotions
I’m feeling level and relatively happy today. When I’m stressed or worried, though, I feel the anxiety in my stomach and head. I feel like I can’t focus on much else. To continue feeling happy and engaged, I need to spend time around friends, eat good food, and enjoy my time off, feel like I’m not wasting it. The bigger-picture stress would likely decrease if I knew what, exactly, I was working toward (instead of feeling like I’m simply stuck in the routine of working for a paycheck).
Spirit
Focus on mountains, which elicits a sense of freedom, leisure, beauty, and gratitude.
In order to fill the Real-Ideal gaps suggested in the previous exercise, I came up with a quick list of things to do/focus on in the future.
Body: More exercise / time outdoors
Mind: Proactive career exploration / do better at compartmentalizing time for thinking about work/life’s big goals, and renewing
Emotions: Prioritize social time
Spirit: More time outside, at the beach, on hikes, etc.
MINDFUL CHANGE
After the program, I want to make a few changes. 1) slow down a bit and prioritize renewal / enjoyment of the present / exercise and have more fun, 2) continue to work hard, but make sure that work is in focused pursuit of long-term goals. My degree path was focused, but the endgame was a bit ambiguous. I want to use this experience/degree as a springboard toward a more definitive goal/idealized future.
Making time for things like exercise will help my mind/body. I don’t sleep well, and partly that’s because my mind races and thinks through to-do lists and future plans constantly, but also partially because I never exercise. Slating time most days to “sweat it out” I’m sure would help fight anxiousness and help me sleep deeper.
Getting rid of my commute would also be huge, freeing up a bit of time in the evenings for walks, and a bit of time in the morning, which would let me go to bed later (more renewal on both ends). Getting out from behind a computer all day would also help. I might need to sacrifice cooking some nights in order to exercise and reset my brain.
Conclusion
Mindfulness is about being aware of what’s happening inside of and around us (Boyatzis, p. 112), and looking back on the past few weeks, I absolutely see that the act of mindfulness has slowly become a major emphasis in my day-to-day routine. I’ve become more aware of the sort of nagging desires for my future that have lain dormant, and I’m now ultra-aware that I’ll have an opportunity after finishing this program and receiving my degree to, in a way, reinvent my career.
Those realizations make me feel more awake, and they’ve inspired me to add specific agenda items for change to my schedule — books to buy, information to seek out, structures to form. These exercises are really just a starting point, though. They help us to conceptualize. Next, it will be time to act.
References
Boyatzis, R., & McKee, A. (2005). Resonant
Leadership (5th ed.). Harvard Business Press. ISBN: 978-1-59139-563-8
McKee,
A., Boyatzis, R., and Johnston, F. (2008). Becoming a Resonant Leader. Harvard
Business Review Press. ISBN: 978-1-4221-1734-7
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