Chapter 23
Start Doing
Take Focused, Smart Actions
“You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.”
—Attributed to Plato
It is go time. You have put in some serious work and have everything you need to move forward. So climb up that high dive, take a good look at where you currently stand, and get ready to jump. It may be a little scary, but you can do it. By reading this book and answering the questions as they pertain to you, you are prepared to begin achieving your goals.
The first few steps of doing are always the most difficult, but after a few days of action, you'll hit your stride. There is nothing that feels better and motivates you more than moving toward your goals. Action beats intention any day. When you begin to choose actions and behaviors that create the results you want, you are also creating the life you want. It isn't rocket science; it is understanding that if you don't do anything, you won't get anything. Things only change if you take some action. It's hard to get a job if you don't put in a resume. It's hard to return to school if you don't put in an application. It's hard to find someone to date if you don't put yourself out there. One of the laws of life is that action creates results. So let's move from analyzing, strategizing, and planning to real-life action, progression, and accomplishment.
It Is Up to You
If you really want to create your Best Job Ever!, then you are going to have to put some effort and time into it. You have to move past excuses, overcome your life-long ruts, and hold yourself accountable for personally creating the life and career you want. This is not just motivational speak; it is realizing that if you are going to become the person you want to be, you have to be responsible for the day-to-day choices. This is the moment to stand up and decide that you are going to do what it takes. No matter the barriers, the naysayers and everything negative your brain can come up with, you can make the decision to behave in a way that is best for you in the long term. You can't spend the rest of your life giving in to the worst part of you. Let the best part of you take the steering wheel from here on out.
Results Matter
From this point on in your career journey, you are going to start measuring your life according to your results. You are going to start keeping score with yourself. What did you do today that moved you closer to your goals? Forget what you hope will happen or what you intend to do. When you start to see results, you will know you are progressing. That is reality. At work, you are measured by results. In any sport, you are measured by results. In school, our kids are measured by results. That is how life works. That is reality. So start recognizing the rules for your life.
It's Better to Try and Fail
While studying journals and interview transcripts of patients who knew they were dying in the near future, nearly every person wished that he or she had done things, that for one reason or another, they had chosen not to do. Opportunities had come but were missed perhaps because of fear, insecurity, the possibility of failure, or just not knowing how. What caught me off guard was that nearly all of these patients, at the end of their lives, weren't concerned about whether or not the opportunity would have turned out the way they wanted—whether they would have succeeded or failed—they only wished they would have tried! Did you catch that? The results didn't matter to them.
That has made a lasting impression on me. As William F. O'Brien's poem title states, “it is better to try and fail than never to try at all.” Sounds like a cliché, but that mentality is one I have always tried to teach my children. The outcome is never as important as the effort, because one day your outcome will match your effort and you will amaze yourself with what you've accomplished and what you've become.
Use the Tools and Act to Make a Difference
If there is one thing I love about my job, it is when I get to witness people amaze themselves. I watch for it every day—the amazing things people do that positively affect companies, industries, communities, and perhaps most importantly, another person. They are inspiring because most of these individuals are no different from you and me, only they decided to act differently. Like Max Sidorov, a person you most likely have never heard of—but you may recognize one of his actions in which the outcome amazed even himself.
Karen Klein was on a school bus with a slew of middle school kids. The 68-year-old bus monitor earned $15,600 a year for ensuring the safety of the children as they made their way home each day after school. Her job responsibilities included protecting the kids from physical or verbal abuse. Unfortunately, the kids didn't do the same for Karen. Then one day on the bus, one of the students decided to videotape what Karen's job was really like. When the video went viral, it horrified the nation and caused an international outrage. The videotape caught students taunting and making fun of Karen with a stream of profanity, insults, and comments about her weight and her family. They told her they wanted to come to her home and steal from her. Another boy told her that she didn't have any family because “they had all killed themselves because they didn't want to be near her.” (Little did that boy know that Karen's oldest son had committed suicide 10 years earlier.) The comment caused Karen to begin crying, but the kids didn't stop there.
The kids jabbed at her arm with a book and continued their mocking. When you watch the video, it is hard to believe anyone could be so calloused and hurtful. As the bullying continued, Klein told the children, “I am a person, too. I shouldn't be treated this way.” For Karen, this was a time when everything was going wrong.
The local news broke the story. It was picked up by international news agencies within hours. The outcry for the boys' punishment was immediate and local authorities approached Karen to see if she wanted to press charges against the boys. The first of two amazing things happened: Karen decided to not push for criminal charges against the boys, but requested that they only be punished.
“They are not all bad boys,” she said to the local news. She only wanted to “make sure that they never do this again, to anybody.”
After the story was publicized, a second amazing thing happened: someone chose to act on what he witnessed rather than just watch. (I will be the first to admit when I learned about the story I immediately watched the video, felt bad, decided to talk to my kids about the story that night and then went back to my normal life.) But Max Sidorov from Toronto, Canada, did more. He heard the story and decided to take 15 minutes (yes, 15 minutes) to set up a fundraiser for Karen on the Indiegogo website so that he could help out, even if only in some small way, to get her away from that negative environment. He thought maybe a trip would be a nice thing for her. The fundraiser brought in more than $700,000 dollars and allowed Karen to retire. The action of one man for 15 minutes had a lasting effect on another individual's life.
You may be wondering: why the 15-minute Max Sidorov story? There are two reasons: first, Karen was an incredible example and amazed the nation (and perhaps herself) by exhibiting the Seven Life Tools to Get Through Difficult Times (see Chapter 22). Second, the story shows that small actions can have dramatic results in life. Likewise, you can have an extraordinary effect on your career by taking small action steps, especially if done consistently over time. Even if it is only 15 minutes. I have witnessed this firsthand. Fifteen minutes a day devoted to your career or to improving your life can have monumental results when added up over a month, six months, or a year. The power of compounding occurs! Whether the action is large or small, it always has an effect. Now is the best time to pull the trigger. Begin now because nothing will change in your life or in anyone else's life if you don't choose to act.
Be Patient with Change
The problem with change is that you want the results all at once. (Me, too!) You have watched one too many sitcoms in which everything gets resolved by the end of the show. Change in real life requires more time and is often a difficult and a hard road to walk. It is more about gaining momentum and moving forward than about how long the process takes.
No Excuses!
“It is too hard… I'm too tired… I can't.” My children learned early on that comments like these were going to earn them a one-way ticket to finishing what they thought was too hard. If you think something is hard, that is the very reason you should do it. You have an invaluable lesson around the corner for you to learn. I have worked with individuals who struggled just to make it to my office. One of my clients, Melinda, will help you reset your perception of your life. Melinda is one of the coolest people I know and a phenomenal person to work with. She is witty, hardworking, and a powerhouse. She loves music, concerts, and men (although not in that order, she told me). Melinda has one small issue: half of her body is twisted such that she can barely walk. With her typical positive attitude she told me, “just wait until after my 15 surgeries, I will grow five inches and walk like Heidi Klum.”
I have watched her go through half of those painful surgeries and only a few times have I ever heard her say it hurts. She is a realist, but she also has things she wants to do and a certain type of life she wants to live, and her issues are not going to hold her back. I never hear her say, “I can't” or “it is too hard.” She keeps moving forward, progressing and doing amazing things in spite of her limitations. Her positive can-do attitude makes all the difference in the world. So before you make the excuses and let your issues hold you back, think of Melinda's inspiring example.
Safety or the Storm?
In life, there are many different types of people. There are some who like to live life safely, do what they can to not rock the boat and live as stress-free a life as possible. When life begins to look scary or uncertain, they have a difficult time. On the other side of the spectrum are those who are considered more risk takers. They enjoy the storms of life. They like to take chances, be stretched, and experience all that life has to offer. They have little to no fear of failure.
In the past, as you have faced uncertainty and change, which end of the spectrum have you been on? If you are going to make some changes in your life, you have to realize you may be giving up your safety anchor for a bit of a rougher ride in the storm. That's okay, just be aware of the difference between staying in the harbor and being out in the storm.
You Are Prepared to Succeed.
As you have worked your way through this book and deliberately answered the questions and applied the knowledge, you have gained greater self-awareness and a new perspective that will begin to Revolutionize Your Life. You've been able to Rethink Your Career: you now know there is no perfect job but you can improve aspects of the one you currently have. Or, if you choose to find a new job instead, you know what to look for to ensure that it will be personally fulfilling. You are now more aware of your personal priorities because you have Redefined What Rich means to you.
You now have a strategic plan to move forward in creating your Best Job Ever!
Just Do It Already!
We have had enough talk. Now is the time for you to go and accomplish. Bless the world with your talents, abilities, and incredible mind. Make a difference in what you do and for the people with whom you interact. The secret is to take action every single day to get the momentum moving you toward your dream. This requires only one assignment: each day, write down what action you are going to take that day to achieve your goal. You will thank me later—especially if you keep at it for more than 30 days.
Remember that doing is the most important part of getting your Best Job Ever! Your daily actions are what will move you closer and closer to what you want from your life and your career. If sometime in your journey toward your Best Job Ever you feel like you have stalled and things are not going well, the first thing you need to do is take some action! I can promise that there will be difficult times ahead, but anytime you do anything worthwhile it is going to be hard.
You now have the tools you need to succeed. Believe in yourself and move forward with confidence.
I wish you all the best in your journey.
Dr. C.K. Bray