Drowning in Career Comfort

Are you happy with what you do to earn a living?  Before you quickly answer yes, I did not ask if you were comfortable with the amount of money that you make or if you felt comfortable in knowing you could do your job.  Those are the things that many people associate with happiness.    But you definitely won't see happiness on the shelves at Walmart or Target (although they would try to sell it if they could) and it will not fall from the sky and on your head as you sit in traffic during your commute each day.  Real career happiness cannot simply be achieved when one's income reaches a certain level or when one finds something that he can do well although both do factor into job satisfaction.

This is a question that I ask myself to determine whether or not I am REALLY happy with my job and career:  Do I enjoy going to work and being there at least 80% of the time (4 out of every 5 work days)?  If you want to find a career like this and be successful, it's almost a definite that you will have to endure a great deal of sacrifice or discomfort at the beginning and possibly on quite a few intervals throughout.  I am not at this point in my career but I am working toward it.

Too many times we approach our lives and careers with trepidation.  We seek conventional and familiar patterns so there are little to no unknowns.  We see it as one less thing to be concerned or worried about in this crazy, sometimes chaotic world.  The problem with getting too comfortable is all our potential goes to waste and we are stuck with woulda, coulda, and shouldas in old age.  I encourage everyone to seek out real career happiness and get out of your comfort zone for at least a little bit.  I'm not telling anyone to quit their day job immediately and attempt to start the next Google. But make a good plan to do something that you think will make you happy and carry it out properly.  You don't want to wake up one day and realize you've spent 25 years at a job that made you miserable because you were simply afraid or too lazy to reach for something greater.  That is my desire and I hope it is your desire as well.

Image: Drowning Hand via NationalMortgageProfessional.com