January 23, 2020 | by David March.
In this video, I will be clarifying the difference between short-term happiness and long-term contentment in one’s career. I will also signify the key points of what it takes to sustain long-term contentment in a realistic manner.
Short-Term and Long-Term Happiness in Your Career
When it comes to the short term, the key here is small victories, investing in yourself and a coach to help you do the research and overcome obstacles. This will get you a step closer to the small victories. It can also create a momentum for further victories, which will eventually snowball into bigger ones.
A lot of the time this means not losing perceptive as you may not want to do the grunt work that leads to the greater objective. What gives motivation in this case is clarity and belief. Seeing clearly how these smaller steps will add up to the central goal you really want and believe that what your doing is meaningful to that end.
Short-Term and Long-Term Happiness in Your Career
In today’s digital age and business landscape, there is so much information coming towards us in forms of notifications, rings and dings from smartphones or in a work environment where everything is fast-paced and there is always something urgent to do.
Our effort, time, and attention have become a high-interest commodity. As a result, we are seeing more and more people involved in more than just one activity and multitasking.
Being pulled in so many directions, it can take us away from our “central goal” we have for our lives. Setting aside the time it takes, takes our effort, time, and attention. This is primarily caused by the time it takes to re-focus on your central goal in your hero’s journey. Many are juggling several different responsibilities at home, work, family life, social life. When looking to accomplish something personal, the time gets lost.
When you are concerned with just one activity and everything it has to offer, your outcomes are more accurate, precise, and detailed. The key is to think in terms of a big picture and then break it down into small steps.
This is what a coach can do for you. In managing the process, a good coach will ask questions like what is the one thing you can do that will have the most impact on your career success. Furthermore, it is important to focus on the present, what needs to be accomplished now, not the past or mistakes you made. There is a saying: Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That’s why they call it the present!
The Key to Achieving Sustainable Long-Term Happiness in Your Career
Now, when it comes to long-term sustainable happiness and success there are two things that are of most importance:
- Self-Discovery and
- A concept called “Flow.”
Flow State
When it comes to being more productive and happy in your career overall, it is important to reach your optimal level of performance. It’s also described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.” In the book, he describes being fully engaged as the state of flow, defined as a state of concentration or complete absorption with the activity and the situation at hand. This means being both mentally and emotionally engaged; they are united, and when united, they produce the feeling of the optimal experience.
Finding the Right Amount of Stress
Finding your optimal level of engagement is related to the right amount of stress. Meanwhile, finding the right amount of stress is dependent on your self-understanding.
This is not easy; however, like anything else in life, being successful at it takes constant effort, time, and attention. It is also important not to get too excited about small results and breeze through the process. This is especially true with regard to understanding yourself.
Below is a graphic illustration I made to further explain finding your peak zone of performance.
Achieving Flow State
A book titled “Ikigai” explains the Japanese secret to a long and happy life. In my coaching training, I studied and was trained on these ideas and concepts. They are key to what it takes to sustain long-term contentment in a realistic manner.
Some action steps to help you on your journey towards success as the book suggests are to take out a journal and write down the answers to these questions:
- What do the activities that drive you to have the flow experience have in common?
- Why do those activities drive you to flow?
- Do you flow more when doing things that require you to move your body or just to think?
There is also another book that I really enjoy and can help you in your self-discovery it is called “Finding the Zone” by Gordon Lawrence. Gordon brings together the idea of the 16 Myers-Briggs personality types and shows how each type can find their flow most effectively. Explaining the different kinds of mind and how they reach the zone of performance differently.
If this sounds interesting to you we can work together on a live coaching session and I can manage the process of your self-discovery for you and then help you connect that to your ideal career.
I hope you enjoyed this article. See you next week.
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