Finding A Job That Is Fun Is A Common Ideal For Many Of Us
I know I’ve tried to create this kind of ideal job many times. I’ve always tried to do professionally what I wanted to do personally.
For example, I was a meditation teacher because I wanted to meditate. I was a photographer because I liked photography as a hobby. And even now, I’m a facilitator because I like to do The Work.
But a lot of the time doing fun jobs, or jobs I really wanted to do, didn’t make much money.
Because I Was In It For Myself
I wanted to be paid to do my hobbies.
And sometimes it worked. But often it didn’t. Because my hobbies were often not of much service to others. For example, I was a nature photographer for three years and made almost no money. People loved my photos. But they didn’t need my photos. So they rarely bought them.
In addition, lots of other people love photographing too. In fact, people like photographing so much, many of them are willing to share their photos for free.
That’s the problem with trying to make a living doing something you love, that everyone else also loves doing.
So Over Time I’ve Shifted
Now I facilitate The Work of Byron Katie. And yes, I do love it. But my mind is in a different place now. It’s not so important to me if I love it or not. What is important to me now is how I can be of service.
And that’s why I can make a living at it. Because my focus is on serving. And I’m willing to do the stuff that other people don’t want to do.
A Client Also Discovered This In Her Work
She wanted a full time job that was stimulating and fun. And because of the extreme limitations of these criteria, she was not only finding it difficult to find a job like that, but she was finding it difficult to even get motivated to look for one.
It was almost an impossible situation.
When she questioned her thinking, she discovered that even her free time was not stimulating and fun for her. Because the focus was mainly on herself, and all the self-fixing she needed to do.
But through inquiry she saw that what really makes her get interested and enjoy herself is when she is serving others. That’s when it gets fun and stimulating. That’s when she finds herself putting up with even the yucky parts of a job.
So She Took It Further
She looked at the most mundane parts of her type of work, in her case doing the paperwork, and found all the ways that it is genuine service to her boss, to her clients, and to herself. And suddenly, her heart started to open to even this part of work that she had resisted. Suddenly, looking for a job didn’t seem so impossible.
The bottom line is: if your focus is on service, any job, even scrubbing floors, can be fun and stimulating.
I think that’s why devotional traditions of all kinds emphasize service. It opens the heart.
Have a great week,
Todd
“Who would you be without your story that you’re supposed to have a career as an artist? You’d be that saint down there flipping burgers or scrubbing floors. You’d be in my favorite position: the position of servant.” Byron Katie, Question Your Thinking, Change The World
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