What should you do with your life?
Eric Barker stashed this in Diabolical Plans For World Domination
Stashed in: #TED, #inspiration, Best Posts, #happiness, #greatness, Young Americans, Motivation, Practice, Advice, Retweet this., Life, Decisions, Productivity, @bakadesuyo, Awesome, Philosophy, 10,000 Hours, Meaning of Life, Slow, Email, Late Bloomers, Jobs, Manifestos, HBR, There is no finish line., Kaizen, The Internet is my religion., Maslow!, Morgan Freeman, Happiness, Never give up., Self-Actualization, Bucket List
What the hell am I doing? Seriously?
Another great lede:
Wouldn’t it be so much easier if you got a letter in the mail when you were seventeen, signed by someone who had a direct pipeline to Ultimate Meaning, telling you exactly who you are and what your true destiny is? Then you could carry this letter around in your pocket, and when you got confused or distracted and suddenly melted down, you’d reach for your wallet and grab the letter and read it again and go, “Oh, right.”
That’s from Po Bronson’s book What Should I Do with My Life?.
The whole article is a great read: http://www.bakadesuyo.com/2013/06/what-should-you-do-with-your-life/
Another great post from Eric Barker! Thanks so much, Adam! I'm learning so much!
Me too! For more, watch Dan Ariely's TED Talk, "What makes us feel good about our work?"
One of Dan Ariely's big tips is to minimize the time we spend on email:
http://99u.com/workbook/16527/why-emailing-gives-you-a-false-sense-of-progress
Important: Don't do something you hate.
What was the single most unanimous piece of advice?
Do not stay in a job you dislike.
And if that’s not strong enough, in the Harvard Business Review Daniel Gulati broke down the top career regrets people have. What were the top two?
1. I wish I hadn’t taken the job for the money.
2. I wish I had quit earlier.
Read more: http://www.bakadesuyo.com/2013/06/what-should-you-do-with-your-life/
Great advice from Eric Barker:
You need to go become good at something.
Cal Newport, author of So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love, says it best:
My advice is to abandon the passion mindset which asks “What does this job offer me? Am I happy with this job? Is it giving me everything I want?” Shift from that mindset to…“What am I offering the world? How valuable am I? Am I really not that valuable? If I’m not that valuable, then I shouldn’t expect things in my working life. How can I get better?”
Read the whole article: http://www.bakadesuyo.com/2013/06/what-should-you-do-with-your-life/
I totally agree. Dan Pink makes the point in his book, Drive when he talks about "mastery" being one of the 3 main human motivators. We all have a deep-seated desire to become good at something. For example, after performing before crowds of thousands, I am still working on improving my Elvis impersonation! ;-)
Rich, did you say that you performed an Elvis impersonation in front of thousands? COOL.
Yes, several times around the Bay Area. Some claim that haven't really seen Elvis until you've seen a Chinese Elvis. Still waiting for the call from Las Vegas so I am keeping my day job in the meantime.
Ha! I haven't seen a Chinese Elvis so I'm putting that on my bucket list.
8:25 AM Jun 22 2013