Find Your Calling
How knowing your identity creates lasting happiness.
Over the past couple of years I've worked hard at finding my authentic self. I tried therapy for a little bit and the first thing the therapist had me do was to take an 'Enneagram Test'. The Enneagram test is a personality quiz that identifies you with one of 9 different personality types (and kind of looks like a scary and confusing symbol that you see above). After taking this test I was identified as a "type 2 with a wing of 3" or better known as "The Helper". Type 2s are generally generous, demonstrative, people pleasing, and possessive. I recently started to read more about my Enneagram type as I'm taking this course. As I get to know myself better I wanted to take a closer look at what tendencies I had that may be holding me back, and in contrast what habits will make me flourish. I don't need a personality quiz to tell me that I'm a giver, but what I started to learn was that I need to address my own needs first. What this quarantine time has given me is the gift of time. I have time to take care of myself, which includes time to workout, eat properly, and get better sleep. I also have more time to pause and appreciate everything more, and for that I am so incredibly grateful. It's allowed me to think before I act and ask myself what my motive is for what I'm doing. This has helped me start to sort out the things that make me happy and what doesn't. Which also ties in to what we want and don't want. The course "The Science of Well-Being" touches upon two kinds of "better wanting" and they are:
1. Wanting the right parts of what we already want.
2. Wanting better stuff that we don't want yet.
In order to begin to identify what those things are and how to do accomplish them, we must further identify our character strengths.
Character Strengths
According to Martin Seligman, character strengths are a desire, a disposition to act, or a feeling that invokes the exercise of judgment that leads to recognizable human excellence or instance of human flourishing.
There are 24 character strengths and after taking the character strength quiz (linked at the bottom) you are designated your signature strength (which is essential to who you are) and it ranks the other 24 as well, starting with the character strengths that most strongly represent you to the ones that represent you the least. Studies show that if you can put your top 4 character strengths in to action you will flourish the most. My top four are honesty, kindness, fairness, and love. The homework from week one of the course (which I've touched upon in my previous posts) was to find a different way to utilize these top 4 character strengths for a week. I found some came more naturally than others, but for the most part I was noticing that I leaned in to these strengths not only in my job, but with my friends and family as well. Especially right now, I have been making a concerted effort to be honest and have integrity with my team; I show my friends and family kindness by letting them know I'm thinking of them; I don't judge someone for how they're handling the uncertainty; and I make sure to tell the people most important to me that I love them regularly. What I did notice during this week of leaning in to these strengths was just how often I did use them in my work.
I've always felt incredibly fortunate that I have been able to find two "dream jobs" in my lifetime. They are jobs where I have experienced flow, where time has seemingly flown by! Studies show that if you utilize your character strengths at your job and change nothing else, not only will your productivity go up but so will your overall job satisfaction. This proves that we don't need to find the perfect job to be happy, but what if we did find a job that perfectly challenges us while making us forget to have lunch because we're so engrossed in what we're doing? That would be known as flow in your work!
The features of flow are:
Fixed vs. Growth Mindset
Like I said there are many things in life that come naturally to us, but they are rarely the things that are rewarding. My parents both set an example for me on how you need to work hard to get what you want or to change your circumstances. I have applied this mindset throughout my life, and especially put it to the test when I was trying to become a professional ballet dancer. The odds were stacked against me. I didn't have the best training for the majority of my schooling, and by the time I got in to a professional training program I was already 16 and just a year or two away from auditioning for a professional company. I had a fine body type, but I wasn't abnormally physically gifted for ballet, so I looked at what was in my control. The thing that I was able to manage was how hard I worked, with that in mind I put everything I had in to making the most out of my final two years of training. After long days in the studio, I would go home and stretch (often times falling asleep on the floor in a split...my roommates can attest to this story) and watch hours of YouTube videos of all of my ballet idols. I would practice port de bras in the mirror and memorize the combinations from class, because I knew that if I knew the material I could make the most out of the classes. This work ethic and mindset did land me a job at The Washington Ballet when I was 18 years old, and has translated to my success at Equinox over a decade later.
The book "Mindset" by Carol Dweck was one that I read a couple of years ago. It immediately resonated with me when she started talking about a "growth mindset". A growth mindset by Dweck's definition is the belief that intelligence can be trained and that most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work. Where as a "fixed mindset" is the belief that basic qualities like intelligence and talent are fixed traits. When someone with a growth mindset does poorly it just makes them work harder.
When we are so transfixed on the outcome we often miss the lessons from the journey. If it weren't for wanting to soak up every bit of knowledge my teacher was bestowing upon me I never would have become a professional ballet dancer. If I believed that I wasn't smart enough and could never change that, then I would never have worked diligently to become a regional manager for an international corporation. The moral of the story is that is that you will never get anywhere if you don't focus on your mindset. Inquire more in to what your motives and intentions are behind your actions. Are you self sabotaging yourself with your thoughts? What if you could anticipate your actions and consciously make better choices with better habits? Just think about all of the opportunities that will present themselves if you just changed one thought. Maybe start by asking yourself..."1. Am I just wanting the wrong things, and 2. Am I missing the best parts of what I already have?"...
Resources
Enneagram:
https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/how-the-enneagram-system-works
Character Strengths:
https://www.viacharacter.org/Account/Register?fbclid=IwAR3d6L6C6NKHXlPPcZ3u_gwT3jeuRO_jS6TcGXOAThc9CLm15tQfnE6aUz8
https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/
Growth Mindset:
"Mindset" by Carol Dweck
Over the past couple of years I've worked hard at finding my authentic self. I tried therapy for a little bit and the first thing the therapist had me do was to take an 'Enneagram Test'. The Enneagram test is a personality quiz that identifies you with one of 9 different personality types (and kind of looks like a scary and confusing symbol that you see above). After taking this test I was identified as a "type 2 with a wing of 3" or better known as "The Helper". Type 2s are generally generous, demonstrative, people pleasing, and possessive. I recently started to read more about my Enneagram type as I'm taking this course. As I get to know myself better I wanted to take a closer look at what tendencies I had that may be holding me back, and in contrast what habits will make me flourish. I don't need a personality quiz to tell me that I'm a giver, but what I started to learn was that I need to address my own needs first. What this quarantine time has given me is the gift of time. I have time to take care of myself, which includes time to workout, eat properly, and get better sleep. I also have more time to pause and appreciate everything more, and for that I am so incredibly grateful. It's allowed me to think before I act and ask myself what my motive is for what I'm doing. This has helped me start to sort out the things that make me happy and what doesn't. Which also ties in to what we want and don't want. The course "The Science of Well-Being" touches upon two kinds of "better wanting" and they are:1. Wanting the right parts of what we already want.
2. Wanting better stuff that we don't want yet.
In order to begin to identify what those things are and how to do accomplish them, we must further identify our character strengths.
Character Strengths
According to Martin Seligman, character strengths are a desire, a disposition to act, or a feeling that invokes the exercise of judgment that leads to recognizable human excellence or instance of human flourishing.
There are 24 character strengths and after taking the character strength quiz (linked at the bottom) you are designated your signature strength (which is essential to who you are) and it ranks the other 24 as well, starting with the character strengths that most strongly represent you to the ones that represent you the least. Studies show that if you can put your top 4 character strengths in to action you will flourish the most. My top four are honesty, kindness, fairness, and love. The homework from week one of the course (which I've touched upon in my previous posts) was to find a different way to utilize these top 4 character strengths for a week. I found some came more naturally than others, but for the most part I was noticing that I leaned in to these strengths not only in my job, but with my friends and family as well. Especially right now, I have been making a concerted effort to be honest and have integrity with my team; I show my friends and family kindness by letting them know I'm thinking of them; I don't judge someone for how they're handling the uncertainty; and I make sure to tell the people most important to me that I love them regularly. What I did notice during this week of leaning in to these strengths was just how often I did use them in my work.
I've always felt incredibly fortunate that I have been able to find two "dream jobs" in my lifetime. They are jobs where I have experienced flow, where time has seemingly flown by! Studies show that if you utilize your character strengths at your job and change nothing else, not only will your productivity go up but so will your overall job satisfaction. This proves that we don't need to find the perfect job to be happy, but what if we did find a job that perfectly challenges us while making us forget to have lunch because we're so engrossed in what we're doing? That would be known as flow in your work!
The features of flow are:
- Challenging but attainable goals
- Strong focused concentration
- The activity is intrinsically rewarding
- Feelings of serenity
- Loss of self-consciousness
- Timelessness
- Lack of awareness of physical needs
- Complete focus on the activity itself
So how to we find activities and jobs where we can experience this? We need to first take a look at how we are being challenged. As noted by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, "The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times. The best moments usually occur if a person's body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile." The main problem in society is that we believe that what we want is a life of complete leisure. As I mentioned above there are things that we don't even know that we want to have but will actually make us exponentially happier. Often times though people shy way from hard work, because it sounds well...hard! They assume that if something comes easily to them that they will enjoy it more. I can tell you whole heartedly that I have gotten more joy out of the things I've struggled through than the things that I had to put little to no effort in to. Think of all of the high points of your life? Did you accomplish something you didn't think you could? Notice how you weren't listing off all of the shows you binge watched (hopefully..)?
What happens more often than not is we get stuck in this continuos loop of negative self talk that tells us that we can't do something or it won't be worth it to try because we might fail. The only thing that self talk is doing to you is holding you back. It is all in our control, it's just a matter of changing our mindset.
Fixed vs. Growth Mindset
Like I said there are many things in life that come naturally to us, but they are rarely the things that are rewarding. My parents both set an example for me on how you need to work hard to get what you want or to change your circumstances. I have applied this mindset throughout my life, and especially put it to the test when I was trying to become a professional ballet dancer. The odds were stacked against me. I didn't have the best training for the majority of my schooling, and by the time I got in to a professional training program I was already 16 and just a year or two away from auditioning for a professional company. I had a fine body type, but I wasn't abnormally physically gifted for ballet, so I looked at what was in my control. The thing that I was able to manage was how hard I worked, with that in mind I put everything I had in to making the most out of my final two years of training. After long days in the studio, I would go home and stretch (often times falling asleep on the floor in a split...my roommates can attest to this story) and watch hours of YouTube videos of all of my ballet idols. I would practice port de bras in the mirror and memorize the combinations from class, because I knew that if I knew the material I could make the most out of the classes. This work ethic and mindset did land me a job at The Washington Ballet when I was 18 years old, and has translated to my success at Equinox over a decade later.
The book "Mindset" by Carol Dweck was one that I read a couple of years ago. It immediately resonated with me when she started talking about a "growth mindset". A growth mindset by Dweck's definition is the belief that intelligence can be trained and that most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work. Where as a "fixed mindset" is the belief that basic qualities like intelligence and talent are fixed traits. When someone with a growth mindset does poorly it just makes them work harder.
When we are so transfixed on the outcome we often miss the lessons from the journey. If it weren't for wanting to soak up every bit of knowledge my teacher was bestowing upon me I never would have become a professional ballet dancer. If I believed that I wasn't smart enough and could never change that, then I would never have worked diligently to become a regional manager for an international corporation. The moral of the story is that is that you will never get anywhere if you don't focus on your mindset. Inquire more in to what your motives and intentions are behind your actions. Are you self sabotaging yourself with your thoughts? What if you could anticipate your actions and consciously make better choices with better habits? Just think about all of the opportunities that will present themselves if you just changed one thought. Maybe start by asking yourself..."1. Am I just wanting the wrong things, and 2. Am I missing the best parts of what I already have?"...
Resources
Enneagram:
https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/how-the-enneagram-system-works
Character Strengths:
https://www.viacharacter.org/Account/Register?fbclid=IwAR3d6L6C6NKHXlPPcZ3u_gwT3jeuRO_jS6TcGXOAThc9CLm15tQfnE6aUz8
https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/
Growth Mindset:
"Mindset" by Carol Dweck
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