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Career happiness is an important part of creating work-life balance. And for many working moms, this leads them to consider making a change in their career. But change feels scary and they got lost in the options and the “what-ifs”. The reason for this, is because they are going about the career change in the wrong way. As a coach for working moms I have a specific method I use to help my clients take the guessing game out of the job search and in today’s episode I am going to share it with you.
Topics in this episode:
How NOT to go about job search
Why you should never start by listing out your options
Why you shouldn’t trust your gut when it comes to making a career change
Where to start in the job-search process
How to calm down your brain when it freaks out about making a change
Show Notes & References:
Want to chat about how to create your own job search compass, so you take the guessing game out of the career change? Schedule a time to chat by going to: www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com/book
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Transcript
Intro
In order to create work-life balance you have to have some level of happiness in your career. 44% of workers right now are seeking new employment for this very reason. Balance is the number one criteria for job change decisions right now, even above salary and benefits. One positive that has come from C0VID, if we even want to say there are some positives, has been the opportunity it has given so many people to go after happiness in their job and to take risks in ways they might not have ever tried. And as a coach for working moms, I have a very specific method I use to help my clients figure out exactly what it is they want next in their career. I want to take the guessing game out of the job search so that they feel certain about any change they want to make. So if you've been contemplating leaving your job or mulling through the options for months or maybe even years, this episode is going to be specifically for you. You ready? Let's get to it.
Welcome to the Ambitious and Balanced Working Mom podcast, the place for women who want to balance their ambitious career goals with their life as a mom. If you're looking to feel more confident, decisive and productive at both work and home, then this is the place for you. I'm your host, Rebecca Olson. Let's get to it.
Happiness is a feeling.
When it comes to creating work-life balance, happiness in your career is essential. You don't have to love your job. I mean, it doesn't have to be the end all be all but you can't hate going. Remember, happiness is a feeling. It comes from the way you think about your job, not the job itself. There is no job that will ever create happiness for you. You create your own happiness by the way you think about your job. So that being said, there are jobs out there that are likely easier for you to think happier thoughts about. Jobs that match your natural skill sets that pay you what you deserve, that give you the energy and the life that you want. These jobs are easy to think thoughts about that make you feel really good, right? And then there are, of course, jobs that are much harder for you to find those more positive thoughts. Jobs that are more difficult for you to feel that contentment in - not that you couldn't work at it, not that you couldn't shift your perspective or your mindset or find things about the job that makes you feel good, but it is simply more difficult to do so.
As a coach for Working Moms, I help all of my clients find their strengths in their current job. I help them find ways of thinking about it that make them enjoy it more than they are now. To see their contributions and help them focus their attention on the things that they achieve instead of the things that they don't. And to focus their attention on the things that they're really good at in their job instead of the things that they're not. And I want all of my clients to shift their mindset to find more happiness in their current job. And because of that, for some of them, that's enough. For some of them, that rekindles enough joy in their current job that they don't need to go looking for another one. In fact, I would say that's the case for maybe 25% of my clients that I work with. They come to me thinking that they need to change jobs because they're so unhappy and then because we just simply retrain their brain to think about their job differently, and to think about the things that they accomplish, and the things that they bring to it, and their strengths, and the things that they like, and the values that it brings, we train their brain to start thinking about it differently and that changes everything for them. And all of a sudden, happiness resurfaces for them in a way. And they decide it doesn't make sense for them to change jobs and for other people. We work on all of that, and they do, in fact, feel better about their current job, and it doesn't make sense for them to stay in it long term. And so we start the process of thinking about what's next for them. What do they really want in their career? Where do they want to be in the next ten years? Where do they want to be by the time they hit retirement? We start working on all of those things. In this podcast, I want to specifically talk to the listener that has been mulling over this idea of changing their job in order to increase happiness, or maybe they've even taken some steps. They've applied for jobs, they've looked around, they've been on interviews for jobs, but they just feel stuck. They're not exactly sure what it is they want, or they feel so kind of paralyzed by fear in the process that they feel stuck in that. I am writing this podcast specifically for you. That being said, if you know that you don't want to change careers, you just simply want to be happy in your career, the process is going to be very similar for you. So I want you to still pay attention because no matter if I have a client that wants to change careers entirely or if they just want to feel better in their current job, either way, we still start with the same process.
So before I even get started, I want to make sure that, you know, there is a right way to go about figuring out what's next in your career. Or maybe, let me say it this way, there's a more useful way for you to figure out what's next in your career. And I want to explain that to you because here's how I see a lot of people approaching a job search or approaching their career change that is just simply not working for them. The first thing that they do is they list out their options. It seems super logical to do it that way. Look at all of the things that are out there for you, right? Could you stay at the same job? You can change companies. You could change jobs within the company. You can go part-time. You can take a leave of absence. You could find something new that uses your background in a different way. If you were a teacher trying to figure out what was next in your career, your options might look like this. You might stay at the same school. Or you might decide to change age groups or subjects. Or you might change schools within the district. Or you might change districts. Or you might try to do, like, a shared teaching assignment. Or maybe you'd go into administration. Or maybe you'd find a nonprofit that can use your educational background. Or maybe you'd take a school year off or a semester off, something like that.
Your gut is probably never going to tell you to take a risk
This is where most people start, they look at the options. And then they look at each one of them and try to sort out if it's right for them. They sort of do this, like, gut check with each one of them. My husband and I like to talk about it like we're wearing hats. You sort of imagine yourself in that role or doing whatever that thing is. And you try to picture yourself doing it day after day and you think about how that makes you feel. And if you're connected to it and all of this is you just trying to connect with, is this right? For me, the problem is your gut feeling is based completely on what's comfortable. Your gut is probably never going to tell you to take a risk. It is always going to guide you towards the safest option that makes your body feel safe and feel calm. But of course, the safest, most comfortable decision is probably not the one that's going to make you happy. Your gut is also likely following the emotion of the moment. For example, if you were that teacher that was looking to potentially change jobs when the fall time comes around and school starts back up again and you're kind of back into the routine, you're probably not feeling all that happy about it. You have the whole school year in front of you, and so your gut is probably going to tell you, and it's going to be much more comfortable telling you you probably should change jobs. This probably isn't the right thing for you. But then, of course, during the summertime when you have this time off and you just, uh, love being able to have the six weeks off or however much you have off, your gut is probably going to tell you that, oh, uh, you're probably just fine you can make it through the school year. This is good. The benefits are too good. The benefits outweigh the negatives. Your gut kind of ebbs and flows based on how you're feeling, not necessarily based on what is right for you or what's best for you or what you really want in your life.
So you really can't follow your gut. If you're going to be trying to figure out what's next for you in your career. Following this method, you're likely going to feel stuck and uncertain, and you're going to be in this up and down roller coaster, feeling pretty lost in the midst of it. And that makes sense, because if you're going to make a really big change in your life or in your career, you don't want it to be based on comfort or what's comfortable in the moment. You want to base it on your bigger goals. You want to base it on what's best for you. You want to base it on things like your happiness, right? So you need to have some level of certainty around what it is you want and why you want it if you're going to make some type of change. And this is what I help all of my clients do, I help them feel certain about what they really want next in your career. Because change is already scary enough. Even if you know exactly what it is you want to be doing and what's right for you, it likely still feels scary. Because change is always scary. That isn't a problem. We're not necessarily trying to get rid of all of the fear. My goal as your coach is to help you feel certain about what you want as much as you possibly can to try to balance out that fear that is also always going to be there when it comes to change.
What makes you happy?
So I take a different approach with my clients. I don't look at the options first. I look at what makes you happy. First, remember, happiness is not a job. It's an emotion. It's a feeling. And so we want to look at the things that naturally energize you in life. We want to look at your strengths. We want to look at your past and think about the things that made you come alive. We want to look at the things that motivate you. We want to look at the things that you value, the things that you find most important. We want to look at your bigger goals. The process starts with YOU understanding you and putting words to it so that it becomes useful to you.
Creating your compass.
Then, it becomes what I like to call your Compass. And then after we develop that Compass, after we really know who you are, what you're all about, what makes you happy, and you feel really connected to those ideas and those words, then we look at that and we say, okay, where are you pointing me? What options make sense based on what you now know about you. What options make sense based on what you now know makes you happy. Notice how different a question that is? We're not trying to find some magical gut feeling of rightness based on our options. Instead, we're starting from the inside out. We're looking at what makes you happy first, and then we're saying, where are you pointing me? Where is that happiness pointing me? Where am I most going to find that? What are my options based upon that? Thinking about your career in this way, of course, it's still going to feel scary, because, as I've said, change is always scary - but whatever options you end up with, you're going to feel immensely more certain that they will make you happy and that they're going to be right for you because they're not based on some magical gut feeling, they're based on the data of who you are as a human being. The result of that is that whenever your brain does freak out because you have decided to leave your job from the last ten years to start a business, or you decide to leave the security of being a teacher to go use your skills in a nonprofit, or you decide to leave your company that you've grown your career at to go be a part of a startup. When you go and make the change, your brain when it freaks out, because it feels scary and risky, you'll know exactly how to calm it down. You'll be able to tell your brain, hey, here's how we got to this conclusion. Here's what I know makes me happy. Here's where I know my strengths lie, here's where there's energy, here's what I value, and this job matches that. So now, when your brain starts to freak out, you have a very specific reason to go back to help show your brain this isn't actually all that risky. This is common sense based on what makes me happy. And then, even though it's scary, your brain is going to calm down so much more because you're going to feel so much more certain about what it is you want and why you're doing what you're doing.
My goal as your coach is to help you find certainty.
If you've been going about trying to make a career change, trying to be happy in your career, following the first method, feeling stuck and confused, now is the time, more than ever, to reach out and chat. I have a very specific process that I will help you to figure out exactly what makes you happy, what you're all about, what drives you, what motivates you, where your purpose lies in life, where you want your impact to be in life. We're going to sort all through those various questions, and then we're going to use the answer to those questions as a Compass to guide you to what's next. My goal as your coach is to help you find certainty around where you want to take your career next. So we take the guessing game out of everything so that you feel 100% about whatever your next step is. And then together we can work through some of the fears that are going to come up with the change that is inevitable whenever we make change in our life.
So now is the time for us to connect, to talk about this process and for me to help you figure out exactly what is next for you. I know 100% I can help you. And it starts all with a free breakthrough call. You can go to www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com/book to find a time slot in my calendar for us to connect about this process, for me to talk more about it, to hear more about where you're at in the career search, what you've tried, what's worked, what hasn't worked. And then for you to get more details around exactly what we would do in coaching to see if we'd be a good fit.
Now is the time to make a change.
I'll put the URL in the show notes as always and working moms, if you are out there looking for happiness in your career and you have been doing things backwards, do not worry. Now is the time to make a change, to shift, to start thinking about who you are at the core, what you are all about, what brings you natural happiness, where your strengths and your motivations lie and then use that as your guide. I'm here for you if you want a very specific process and method and as always, I will see you next week. Let's get to it working moms.
Outro
Hey, before you go, I want to take a moment and tell you about an opportunity to speak with me directly. If you've been listening to this podcast and still feel like you need help balancing a fulfilling career with motherhood, Then I encourage you to schedule a free breakthrough call. On this call, we will get Crystal clear on exactly what it is you want out of your career and how you want to balance that with motherhood. And then we'll craft next steps for you to start moving toward a more calm and fulfilling, um, working mom life. Head over to www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com/book to apply for this free call. Till next week, and working moms, let's get to it.
