Follow your Gut to find Fulfilment
Recently, I was a guest on a podcast called The Switch, which is about making a career change and one of the questions I was asked was when it comes to fulfilment at work, does it require a complete career overhaul or just a mindset shift?
And then, I was catching up with Season 3 of Ted Lasso on Apple TV, and there was a brilliant moment with Mae, the pub landlady:
"For some, it’s better to follow your gut than pretend to be excited by someone else’s"
Both the question and Mae’s maxim really got me thinking.
I think both require awareness of WHAT you are doing and WHY.
So many people rise through the ranks or climb a career ladder because it’s the next obvious step. The next step to success at that company or success in that industry.
We can often be so busy doing that we don’t really look at where we are going or question it. We may have at times a slight ‘meh’ feeling about our jobs but we are far too busy living and working to think about it too much.
And I think you can happily do this until the ladder rungs out of rungs and there’s nowhere left to climb OR that ladder is pulled out from under your feet in the form of industry change, restructures, redundancy and so on.
So, back to the awareness of the WHAT and the WHY.
For me, fulfilment is doing the things that energise you, spark joy, make you excited about the day ahead when you see your diary - this is the WHAT bit.
Then you add that to the WHY: knowing that what you are doing results in something that you find satisfying, purposeful and meaningful.
So when I was a producer / director I loved creating films from start to finish, interviewing contributors, going all over the world - that’s the WHAT - and the result was films that would entertain and inform people and hopefully help those contributors - that’s the WHY.
And now that I’m a coach, I love the variety of working with lots of different people and helping them grow in confidence, cast off self-doubt and become fearlessly themselves - that’s the WHAT.
The WHY is that I think too much talent goes to waste and the world loses out as a result, so if I can help people become fearless about who they are, what they stand for and help them achieve great things for the world in general, that’s very meaningful to me.
So to answer the first question - I don’t think finding fulfilment at work means a complete career change unless you don’t like what you are doing and it has no meaningful impact for you.
My question to you would be:
What is it you are doing and why?
Do you find it fulfilling?
And to Mae’s wisdom, I would ask:
How much are you following your own gut or pretending to be excited by someone else’s?
What does your gut say?
And what would life look like if you followed it?
Be fearlessly you and if you don’t know how, book-in a free discovery call here
Take care
Tracy
