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Believing in a Better Lifestyle
Self-Positivity at Work
Grasping Your Life with Both Hands
How many of you have ever thought about the link between believing in yourself, and getting a good income? You would think that your income is based entirely on your skills, wouldn't you. Well, we know how true that one is. So what does play a part in deciding what you are worth in money terms per year?
There's no denying that there are a lot of factors involved in setting a salary, for example, but did you know that in Australia there are about 10 times more applicants for a $25,000 job than there are for one at $50,000? One reason, I believe, is that a lot of people just don't believe that they're worth that much, and so, even if they get the courage up to ask for the job description, they talk themselves against ever applying for it. I recently saw this where I work, when a position at just over $30,000 got a literal flood of enquiries - it was well over 50. You know how many actually put the application in? Only 6. Seriously. It wasn't as though the job description was excessively difficult either. The main thing that put people off was that they had to be prepared to get in a car and travel around the region occasionally. How hard is that? Especially considering a large part of the local population commute for 1 1/2 hours to the nearest city for work...
On a personal level, I used to be in one of those $25,000 jobs. With a Uni degree, and Honours, I thought I was lucky to get it considering the high level of unemployment locally. I sold the company on how much I had to offer. They took me up on it. Then they pushed the envelope, and got even more. Bargain rates! I filled 3 job descriptions, all on my own, and I was still on $25K. After the promised salary and position title review ended up leaving me in exactly the same position, I started feeling I wasn't really being appreciated. You probably know the feeling yourself. That was when I started to think about how much I felt I was worth. I thought about what salary I wanted, and came up against some pretty strong beliefs about how I didn't really deserve more, and I should be grateful for what I had.
Pardon the language, but "stuff that" thought I.
I spent the next few months intensively working on what I believed about myself. I started to make positive affirmations about how much I was worth, and how I deserved to have a decent salary, and I didn't deserve to spend every minute stressed out over how I'd pay the bills. I repeated positive statements about myself to the mirror. I wrote down what I wanted. I did exercises to push the boundaries further.
Then, out of the blue, I got a phone call offering me a job at over $40,000, and apologising because it was probably going to be fairly simple work for me.
That's when I found out about the statistics on how there's a shortage of people applying for top positions.
Now, I agree this is not a scientific study, but it seems like a pretty clear link to me. Especially considering I had a similar (although less deliberate) process happening when I got the $25K job to start with.
Do you have anything over at the end of the pay period? If not, here's a quick exercise to try. Take your current salary. Triple it, and imagine yourself being offered a position at that level. Chances are, you'll start to find all kinds of things coming up - the personal arguments you use to talk yourself out of receiving that much money.
Not convinced?
Get a tape recorder, and leave it playing while you do a role play of you, asking your boss for a raise. Make it a decent one, say $5,000 or so. When you play it back, you'll probably find that there is at least one sentence that you came up with, as yourself, that argued against you getting the raise. "I understand there's not much money at the moment..." is a common one.
Start spending a bit of time thinking about what you are really worth. Forget about the idea of being "selfish" and take a good look at what you have to offer. Work on your beliefs about yourself. As you do, and once it's solidly built into your self-image, you'll start to notice little things coming your way that do improve your lifestyle. Signposts, if you will, that you're on the right track. Maybe a small win in the lottery, or a scratchy. Maybe finding a note on the street, or getting given too much change. You'll know what it is when it happens, if you're still on track. Use them to keep yourself motivated to go that next step further. The sky really is the limit.
Best of luck,
Crystal Woods
© 2000 Crystal N Woods
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Do you feel satisfied at the end of the week that you've accomplished something or made a difference at work, or is it a good week for you when you get as far as Wednesday before you wish it was the weekend?
It amazes me (although I understand totally from past experience) how many people spend five days of the week wishing and waiting for the other two. Five-sevenths of your life is a lot to throw away...
Of course the theory of enjoying your work doesn't always stand up to the realities of the job you have. I think it's a tragedy that so many kids these days are brought up to believe that they'll be lucky to get any kind of job at all, and never put the time or effort into working out what they would LIKE to do. Working that out is one of the best time investments I ever made, and I have to say, continues to be something I re-evaluate every now and again. My ideals do tend to change from year to year, as I grow and redefine my priorities.
If you read the biographies of modern millionaires, you'll find that the majority of them have done this very process.
Back to real life, though. If your passion is surfing and you're not confident enough to start a surfing holiday tour company (two of those millionaires did!) then there are a few ways you can at least salvage some of your self esteem on the job, as a first step to building the life of your dreams. Here are a few ideas that could help:
- One of the best little tips I use at work (and no, I don't have my dream job yet, I run this site and ezine after hours while I go to work to pay the bills. I do, however, have a written plan of where I want to get and how I plan to get there) [12.12.04 - I'm in an even better job now, much closer to that dream, at the time of updating this site! On track so far...] is to take 5 - 10 minutes at the end of the day and write down everything I've accomplished. I use it as a lead in to planning the most important (NOT urgent) things I want to achieve the next day, but that's strictly optional, and doesn't work with some kinds of jobs (like helpdesk support and other crisis response positions). When I can see, in front of me in my diary, that the day has had a result, I find it much easier to put it behind me & go home in a positive frame of mind. Over time, it even made it easier to turn up in the mornings ;-)
- Dealing with Office Politics: if you find that the gossip and backstabbing at work follows you no matter how many job changes and transfers you make, welcome to the real world. it is an unfortunate fact of life that any hierarchical structure will create political manoeuvring. That doesn't, however, mean that you should bare your fangs and dive right in. I read, once, of a brilliant way to turn the tables on the frustration that politics can cause.
The gentleman in question kept changing jobs, and even after he decided to settle down he kept being passed over for promotion. Not only was he not familiar with the rules of the political game, he was outspoken enough about his hatred of it that everyone ended up ranged against him.
Fortunately, he had a boss who explained to him that it was this that was holding him back. He decided to take a fresh approach to his attitude to the job. Of his $40,000 salary, he decided that $10,000 of it was to cover the actual work he accomplished. The rest, he considered was to pay for putting up with all the ... (fill in the blank yourself - there's a filter on this list!)
Needless to say, he shortly got his promotion, and I found life much easier once I took on the same perspective.
- One last tip; mentally separate out what you love to do from what you are paid to do (if, in fact, they are not the same), and tie them back together like this: you get the money to do what you love to do as a direct reward for going to work and doing what you're paid for. This is the old carrot and stick routine. Once you connect a reward with something, it's not so hard to make yourself do it again.
Hopefully, this will give you a starting point to work from, but the bottom line that I want you to take away from this issue is the idea that any job can be easy or hard, and the difference between the two is NOT in the job itself. It's in you. Change your attitude, change your perspective, and the job will seem like a totally different ball game.
Best wishes,
Crystal N Woods
© 2000 Crystal N Woods
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Did you know that before bullfighting there was a magnificent Cretan sport (ancient Minoan civilization) called bull-dancing? This is a fresco of it:
http://www.dilos.com/region/crete/aaa04.html
The bull dancers were unarmed, but using the principles still known in martial arts, literally took the bull by the horns, using it's own strength to perform magnificent acrobatics harmlessly up and over the charging beast.
Do you ever feel your life is a bit like that charging bull? If you do, would you like to know how to "dance" it into a thing of grace and beauty?
The secret is in facing it, taking hold of the horns, and turning them to your advantage. Make your greatest threat a tool to propel you higher than you could go alone. Or, to put it another way, turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones.
This is what successful people of all walks of life already do. This is why so many self-made millionaires are from humble backgrounds. It's the attitude that they take: if they haven't got advantages, they're going to find them anywhere they can, and use them.
The next question is how?
What is the biggest threat in your life right now? Chances are it's something that seems like its going to bring change: a redundancy at work, a relationship breakdown, something else that you've assumed was stable suddenly seeming not quite so solid.
Now, take a look at the reasons why you are fearing this. Face the bull. Do you worry that you're not going to find another job/another partner? Why is that... are you really that unskilled or unlovable? Maybe this is exactly why the situation has come about - you need to address this belief. Maybe you're actually worth MORE than the old job was paying. Could it be that you've been forcing yourself to go to work at something you didn't like doing, and it's time for you to re-evaluate what you would enjoy doing better? Has the relationship degenerated into habit, and do you need to look again at just who the person is you've chosen to partner with? They won't be the same person as 10 years ago. Neither will you. Is it possible that you've grown in different directions, and need to stop holding each other back with outdated ideas of who you each are? Maybe you are now a better match, but in totally different areas.
Just think beyond the event you're facing - focus on the other side of the bull - and try to see just what is likely to change, and needs attention.
Now you're ready. Grab those horns. Make the changes before they're forced on you, on your OWN terms. Start looking at transfers to other departments you'd enjoy working in, interesting alternative companies, even at possible career changes to lines that have always intrigued you. Schedule some time with your partner to really communicate about how you've each changed, and what you each now bring to the relationship, and want to get from it (even if it is just supportive friendship). It's YOUR CHOICE at this stage. Make it, take it, and leap past the bull to the new life waiting for you on the other side.
Best Wishes
Crystal N Woods
© 2000 Crystal N Woods
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