Do you want to enjoy your work and not feel so drained? Do you want to be happy and fulfilled in your career? Maybe you long to wake up in the morning NOT dreading the day ahead. Career fulfillment doesn’t have to be this elusive goal that you can never seem to reach.
A huge part of getting on the path to career fulfillment is doing the inner work to get clear on what your really want/ need to be fulfilled. And by “inner work”, I just mean asking yourself some deep questions and taking the time and space to reflect on your true answers.
In this solo episode I share with you 5 questions you can ask yourself to get started on the path to career fulfillment.
These questions are really just a starting point for you. In my 1-1 coaching program, The Career Fulfillment Formula, we go through a step by step process to answer these questions in depth. If you are interested in gaining more support on your path to fulfillment, I invite you to apply for 1-1 coaching!
What does Career Fulfillment even mean?
There is no one right definition of career fulfillment. It is highly personal and even something that can change for you over time. If you’ve been listening to the podcast you will notice that I ask all of my guests this question at the end of our episode “what does fulfillment mean to you?” Each answer is slightly different, but there are some common threads.
I invite you to reflect on your OWN answer to this question so you can have a general idea of what you are working towards when it comes to career fulfullment.
For me it means that I am doing exactly what I am meant to be doing. I am having those moments of click where there is nothing else I would rather be doing. In a more global sense it is looking forward to my days and having work that matters and energizes me.
Now let’s look at five questions you can answer to get started on YOUR path to career fulfillment. These questions make up the basis of my program “The Career Fulfillment Formula”.
What are your values?
Your values are essentially what you hold to be most important. They are what drive you and what motivate you. They are what you want to spend your time and energy on. Values can also be related to your sense of what is right or wrong.
My most important value is freedom. When your work doesn’t allow you to practice your values, it will start to wear you down over time. Not living out your values has serious consequences when it comes to career fulfillment.
Values act as your compass and can guide you in the direction of what type of work is most satisfying to you. You also have to define what it means to live out each value on a daily basis. What are the metrics that let you know for certain you are living them out.
One question you can ask to get clear on your values:
“What is most important to you in your life and career?”
What do you enjoy doing?
In finding career fulfillment, you must first believe that your enjoyment matters and then you have to connect to it.
I believe that the things you enjoy are not random or coincidence and they definitely are not silly, self indulgent pursuits.
I love the quote by Rumi about what you enjoy:
“:et yourself be drawn by the strange pull of what you love, it will not lead you astray”
Rumi
To me this means that following your joy can help lead you to the work you are meant to be doing. It may not make sense. You may not know at first how it could lead to a career, but follow it anyways, because within your joy there is something important for you.
Question you can ask yourself to get clear on what you enjoy:
What is it that you like doing? What brings a smile to your face? What is it that makes you look forward to your day?
What are you good at?
Don’t be intimidated by this question. Even if you feel like “I’m not that good at anything”. THat’s just not true. Everyone has things they are good at. You don’t have to be Olympic gold medal status at something to be good at it.
What I find useful to conceptualize is this: it doesn’t have to be one tangible skill that you do better than anyone else on the planet. Instead it’s more about how your unique combinations of skills and personality traits come together to form you zone of genius.
The question you can ask here:
What am I doing when I feel like I am at my best?
What’s NOT working in your current job?
This may be the easiest question of all for you to answer, because it tends to be more natural for us to focus on what’s going WRONG in our lives. But instead of just listing out complaints about things you hate about your job, I want to challenge you to do this a bit differently.
Use the things that you don’t like to gain clarity around what you DO like. To do this we must get specific and clear around what EXACTLY is not working for you in your current job. What about that isn’t working for you? Get curious here about what is missing, what isn’t working and WHY.
The question to ask here is:
What specifically is NOT working for me in my job right now? Why isn’t this working? What WOULD make it work?
How do you want to serve the world?
If you cannot answer this question, then that’s okay. It doesn’t mean that you are selfish. Most likely, it means that you are burned out. If that’s the case- take it as a sign that it’s time to start focusing on YOU and giving yourself time and space to recover from burnout.
Once you’ve recovered, this part of you will come alive naturally because the desire and drive to contribute is an innate need of our soul and spirit.
One question to ask yourself to get clear on how you want to serve the world is: what breaks your heart? Usually what breaks our heart is what drives us ands speaks to us in some way.
