Most people experience times in their careers when they question their choices, wonder about opportunities lost, or roads not taken. Sometimes this is prompted by changes in one’s personal life; aging, becoming a parent, losing a parent, children leaving home, perhaps a divorce. These events are accompanied by a feeling of being lost, and a value dissonance. Your values are suddenly not aligned with how you are living, what you are doing at work or who you are working with.
Other times you can find yourself in this situation because of changes taking place in the organization you work with. Perhaps there is a change of culture and purpose, perhaps a reorganization has taken place and dear friends and colleagues have left or moved, or, the organization has ceased it’s work completely. Leaving you feeling as you are adrift at sea or lost in a forest. There is a sense of loss and grief, both of which should not be ignored, but often is.
When people seek out coaching while in the midst of such a disruption, or more commonly, a short time after, they usually do so because they feel something is wrong but find it difficult to right the wrong. They are not sure where to start because they do not know where they wish to go and why they wish to do so.
Organizations that have gone through a reorganization notice this loss of direction and commitment of their staff in low morale and engagement accompanied by lowered productivity and performance and higher absenteeism. People are adrift.
What can you do to find a renewed purpose and motivation?
Change is a force that can be tamed and used as a catalyst for creativity and purposeful living. To tame a wild force, we need to confront it, own it, ride it out and most of all, listen to it deeply. Think of a Horse Whisperer, as popularized by the movie with the same name. He is intuitively open to the needs, motives and desires of the horse and thus is successful in training and healing the horse. Similarly, we need to listen to what the Change we are in means for us, and, learn what fears are keeping us from using the force to help us create the life or career we desire.
Sometimes what hold people back from moving on is a fear of the pain associated with acknowledging disappointment, anger and sadness, for example if they lost their job in a reorganization. Other times it is the fear of the unknown or the void that comes with a life change. Organizations going through change have fears too. A common concern is that too much transparency and talk about Change will result in opposition, anger and destructive conflict. To share as little as possible, to as few as possible feels like a safer management strategy. While this strategy can feel safe immediately, it is not. Withholding information at length leads to destructive gossip, lack of trust and conflict.
If Change is your uninvited visitor today, then allow it in. Take time to understand its origins and essence, its impact on you and learn how you can tame it to become a welcome houseguest who adds purpose and meaning and opens doors to new opportunities and a better and happier you.
Working with a coach who helps you explore and create your road to success, as you define it, can be helpful. To get started on your own, begin writing your life and career narrative and take charge of it. Keep a change diary. Describe your present and describe your past, identify key life and career events and be open to the feelings and emotions associated with them. Be curios about them. Describe how you are feeling now using words, or images or dance. Whatever works for you. Then ask yourself what in your life story you wish to change and how. Start exploring options to research and try on.
