The other day I was grabbing a coffee with an old colleague of mine who recently moved from one firm to another for a promotion. You would expect someone who just got promoted to be happy, right? Yet I was met with quite the opposite – a person who seemed defeated, discouraged. Of course I then asked her to elaborate a bit on how this came about, as she had moved to what she herself described as her “dream job”.
From the discussion I immediately picked up on a few things which are extremely common. I can easily write a book on each of these, having experienced a number of these myself! The one I will have a quick overview of this week, though, is how important it is to know your true self.
So, here is a woman in her early thirties who studied many years to become a professional accountant, but was unfulfilled in her previous job, then looked for something that may just turn the tide. She then jumped to a higher-paying job in a more senior position – open-and-shut case, right? She very clearly has nothing to complain about, and should be very grateful. After all, there are many people who are worse off, so she should just suck it up and appreciate what she has.
Well, yes and no, so let’s analyse the situation in a more general sense. This week we’ll look at how many folks end up in this very situation, but why you should not just accept something that does not light your fire.
People will often base their next move on the negative emotions that they are feeling about where they find themselves right now. That’s all well and good when you are trying to escape a particularly distressing situation: moving away from an unhappy situation is a logical thing to do, and you should always aim to do that. But as with all things, there is also the other side of the coin: forget what you’re running from for a moment, and consider what it is you’re running towards.
Some smart people have come up with names for these concepts. Sometimes we react to our situation by running away from bad things: we can say that bad things tend to push us away, and so we’ll call those bad things push factors. Good things, or things that we see as desirable, tend to pull us towards them, so those we’ll call pull factors. A lot more can be said about pull factors and push factors, but for now we know enough to be able to talk about these concepts and the important role they play in finding lasting happiness.
The first step when you’re thinking of making a change to your life is always to consider whether you know what you passions are, because if you do not know what truly makes you happy, how can you expect to find yourself in a situation which reflects that? In other words, be wary of basing your decision entirely on push factors. It’s best if you have at least some awareness of what your ideal pull factors would be.
It is like not knowing what your favourite meal is, and then blaming the restaurant for giving you all the ‘wrong’ food – food, I might add, that you ordered yourself. The chef would soon yell at you to stop telling him what food you don’t like and start telling him what you actually would like!
To understand your personal pull factors, those things that draw you and awaken your passion, you really need to know yourself, and this can take some work and some soul-searching. Before making any big decision you need to assess whether your plan is aligned with your blueprint for your life, whether it honours who you are as a person, and all of this comes back to passion and excitement.
Forget about the push factors that are pushing you away from your current situation. Focus instead on the pull factors that should be there to draw you on to your new situation. Are you excited to move on to this new thing? Is it something you’re passionate about? Is it truly pulling you in?
If you make a big life change based only on what’s pushing you away from your current situation, it won’t be long before you feel the same discontentment in your new situation, and you’ll start the whole process over again. You’ll never be happy, you’ll just be stuck on the same old treadmill, and you’ll never get anywhere, let alone somewhere that will bring you lasting happiness and fulfillment.
Remember to be kind to yourself.
Until next time,
Jean-Pierre