This is the Introduction- excerpt from my upcoming eBook, working title: “Career Change From the Inside Out”, to be posted in June on my website: www.counselingjob.net
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Have you noticed lately that things don’t seem to “work” the way they used to? Maybe there are things in your life you seem to have “lost”, your job/career, your confidence, your friends, and your sanity? J Or perhaps there are other things in your life you feel in danger of losing. Lots of fear and uncertainty? Does it seem like you try to do things and nothing seems to work? Or you find yourself in a place where you want change in your life, but seem to be standing still without movement? Perhaps you are unhappy in your job, but are not sure where to go? What to do?
Traditional career counseling has been a process of identifying values, skills, interests, personality and behavioral characteristics. There are a number of great tests exercises and methodologies for doing this. The advent of coaching has changed the field a great deal, because coaching focuses on setting goals, making a list of steps to be taken to get there, adjusting, and checking in with a Coach to keep on track. Achieving those goals. Coaching has proved to be valuable and useful for a number of life and behavioral changing issues. There are plenty of tools and methodologies within the Career Counseling/Coaching profession to help with focus and change.
In the past, as creators of our realities, even if we didn’t know it, the process of “asking” for a change in our lives, like a career change; focusing on it, visualizing the changes we wanted in our lives, usually brought us some kind of result. But that doesn’t seem to work right now. The old ways of change, and even the tools, processes and methodologies-- goal-orientation—do not seem to work. Why? What is lacking? What is that missing piece, or what is it we are doing “wrong”?
Our World is profoundly changing –And So Are We! Why the Old Ways Don’t Work
We are doing nothing wrong. We are experiencing a dramatic shift on this planet. Some say we are actually “ascending” to a more rapid higher-frequency vibratory state –a higher physical dimension. This shift is affecting all of us, whether we know anything about it or not. Sometimes in various ways. Our lives are changing. Some of us are losing what we believed to be the “anchors” of our lives: homes, careers, money, health, and people. Things we believed in. Physically, our DNA is altering.+ Many of us are finding we can’t tolerate old situations. We may feel emotionally drained, physically tired, and wonder what-in the-world is going on. And we may lose confidence in ourselves.
Have you wondered why the world seems particularly crazy at the moment? It is because we can see it more clearly! The world is reflecting this shift. Our global economic system has been severely rocked, and will be changed for evermore. Old institutions are coming down. Old human battles filled with old energy rage on –painfully obvious to all of us. As I write this the media is filled with information about a new strain of swine flu which has circled the globe.
A kind of “bright light” is shining and lots of “dark things” are coming up from under the rocks!
So, too is the light shining in our individual lives. The “dark things” emerging from under our private rocks! Many people are in personal crisis and for many an aspect of that crisis is in their careers. Whether you have lost your job, have been laid off, or no longer believe you are in the right profession, you may be experiencing an aspect of this deep shift we are all experiencing in so many aspects of our lives.
So, if you are in career/job crisis, it is not the “usual or traditional” career crisis. It is a pivotal one. That bright light is shining on you. You are being challenged in a way you never have been! You are being asked to take a look at your old ways of making choices, and to reassess the very basis of how you see yourself, and how you make those career choices.
Choices from the Heart
We are being asked to make choices that come from the heart, rather than the mind. This can be challenging because we are accustomed to using “rational thought” as a basis for our personal decisions. Our minds have been in charge! Not only are we being challenged to dig deeply to discover our true desires, and our “bliss”, without the trappings of some of our old ego-and mind-tools, we are being asked to make choices based on how we FEEL. The new career and job paradigm will be based on complete trust of self: it requires us to have the courage to look deeply within ourselves: to acknowledge what we truly want, to let go of old limiting beliefs, let go of old ideas about stability and certainty. And to make career choices that reflect our passions in life.
If you have now groaned and thought, “Oh –Love yourself!—trust yourself!--those old phrases again!” I do understand you. There was a time when I was so fed up with that line “love yourself, trust yourself”. Everyone is SAYING it, but no one was giving any information on how to DO IT! Yeah, yeah, yeah. Easy to SAY, not so easy to DO! But I know now that we all have the ability to do so. Each in our own way, which is part of the mystery and delicious—and at times frustrating-- challenge. No one can tell us or show us how to do that.
Fortunately though there is plenty of help with respect to where we can focus and begin. This is what I will share with you in this short book.
The global economic system that the old careers have been based in is leaving us. So, jobs and careers are not going to be the same, because the structure of the system within which they operate will change. The new corporate and economic structure is going to support this new approach to personal career selection. From bottom to top, companies will be based on a new and different ideology. This ideology will reflect our individual change because the whole always reflects the parts.
We ASKED for these changes!
What are we being asked to do –or better yet what are WE asking of ourselves? It is no “accident” any of us are here, at this time on planet earth. We “volunteered” to be here now. In fact, we clamored for it! Can you imagine? What are we –masochists? Not at all! We knew when we came to this lifetime we would be confronted with letting go of many of our old ideas and beliefs. We knew we would potentially “rise” to a higher vibratory level, as individuals and collectively. We knew that, in our soul’s journey, we would be a part of the greatest shift this earth has ever seen!
What has traditionally brought about change in your life? Does change come from everything being rosy, hunkey- dory, happy and stress-free? Not usually. Change comes from challenge, from crisis, from being in a place we can no longer tolerate. Often “hitting bottom” as 12-step programs say. (By the way I believe this is changing, and we will not ask ourselves to experience such profound pain in the future in order to make personal changes. But at this point, this is the only way we know!)
So, as with global systems, we individually are being pushed and shoved to see ourselves differently, to do things differently; to think about ourselves differently. And relative to our careers, to begin to understand it is time for us to engage in pursuits that make us feel alive, happy and personally fulfilled. This means we are going to have to let go of a lot of old stuff crawling out from under the rocks – beliefs about work, “stabilities” we have relied on, beliefs about ourselves. And of course, the old ego and fear-based games we have played. We are being –and will continue to be –challenged to look deeply, deeply within, do a housecleaning of old ideas including self worth issues, and come face-to-face with what we truly want to do with our time.
NOTHING is or going to be more important than our connecting to our authentic-selves. New Careers will not “work” for us if we don’t understand that we are being asked to follow our own true desires and passions. New Careers will not work if we are not motivated by the desire to spend time doing what truly makes us happy (which is a reflection of love for ourselves). This is not the time to focus on what makes money, though it may feel that way when you look at your bills! Our new-career pursuits will work in the future if they are based on the “old goals” –money, stability, and ego. As long as we continue to hang on to the idea of pursuing those things first, nothing will change.
For me to spend time telling you how you should write your resume or prepare for interviews is a waste of time right now. Though these things are important, they are only a reflection of the inner-work that needs to be done first. Once you get in the flow of deeply understanding what you want and have to give, your resume will be a reflection of your energy and wisdom. Opportunities will land at your door. People will enter your life who make important connections for you. Interviews will materialize, and you will be your “best self” in them. Ultimately, you will find yourself in a career that is personally fulfilling and meets your individual needs. All of this will come because of your willingness to look deeply within, to “let go,” to maintain faith and confidence in yourself, and to be true to your deepest desires.
A Shift in Global Consciousness and Self-Awareness
We are experiencing a shift in consciousness—individually and collectively. Consciousness by its very nature is expansive and without boundaries. There are no processes or procedures that will work, for the “process” of digging deep will be yours. So the only “process” is your own personal journey.
What you are going to do with your working life from here on out, is SO important, Not only for you yourself, but for the whole. You will be a pioneer in the re-engineering of work. Of our global economic system. Most important though, if you can take on the challenge of ultimately “knowing” that you have the answers, and “owning” that it is your job to get to them, you will find a new personal freedom, a new joy, a new self confidence, and a new way of living, making choices and creating your life.
It is a new self-awareness.
It is less action-based. It is heart-centered and not intellectual. It involves greater presence in the moment, more time to “go within” and listening to the “quiet and still” aspects of ourselves –which is actually full of information and wisdom, if we listen. It involves believing in ourselves rather than deferring to the point of view of others. It is becoming aware of many old beliefs that no longer work.
Self-awareness means seeing the “whole picture.” Digging deeply may result in you seeing parts of yourself you don’t like. In a sense, it may take you on an emotional rollercoaster. Part of the self-discovery process is looking at both our “light” and our “darkness”. We all have these energies within us. And we are being challenged to love and accept ourselves in our totality. Exactly as we are. This is necessary, because how can we know what we truly WANT unless we know what we don’t want? How can we know what we want to BE unless we know what we don’t want to be?
Most of us live quiet and ordinary lives. We do not think of ourselves as heroes. We do not think necessarily in terms of “shifts” on the planet, and certainly would not feel ourselves a part of them. But the truth is, we very much are. The whole is a reflection of ALL of its parts. Each of us, as a part of the whole, is being asked to change, so that the whole can change.
So, in doing this inner work, be bold! Be patient with yourself. Be ready to deal with uncertainty (I can guarantee you a lot of that!). Do not be surprised at your own resistance, just recognize it. Don’t be surprised sometimes to see the absolute worst in yourself. Keep the faith in yourself.
Just by being here in this lifetime, you have proved yourself to be a very special soul indeed. A pioneer. One who “volunteered” to come for a time this world has never seen before. You have something absolutely unique to contribute to this world in your career, and the good news is, you can do that with great joy in your own life. You are part of that evolution, and without you, it couldn’t happen!
So how’s that, for being important?!
With warm regards, Jill
1. This eBook will contain an extensive bibliography
2. See the Kryon material, www.kryon.com
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