How to enjoy your job more in 2020
"I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.”
-Chuck Swindoll
If you want to enjoy your job more, start with how you react to your job. Whether your job includes responsibilities at your office, in your home, or around your school, how you see what you do changes how you feel about what you do. And how you feel about what you do changes how you react to what you do.
If you don’t like your job, it’s likely you act like you don’t like your job. And you may not even realize it.
When you see your job as a chore, it’ll often feel like a chore, and your reactions to having to do your job will come across like it’s a chore – in your face, your attitude, your language.
When you see your job as a privilege, it’ll feel like a privilege, and your reactions will look like you actually appreciate the opportunity to do your job.
This isn’t about letting feelings dictate your behavior, because feelings can get us in trouble when we put them in charge. This is more about recognizing the connection between perspective, feelings, and reactions.
Recognizing that connection consistently can be fostered by building it into your culture. If you want to go through that progression as part of your normal routine – seeing your circumstances accurately, developing healthy feelings toward your situations, and reacting well in response – start building it into your culture:
Create experiences that prompt you to live in reality – perform evals, observe people, have more conversations.
Provide opportunities for people to discuss how they feel – team meetings, date nights, professional coaching or counseling.
Assess your reactions – hold one on ones, review whether you were able to withhold defensive responses in conversation, solicit feedback.
I don’t mean to oversimplify the matter, but choosing to respond well to circumstance we don’t enjoy is one of life’s master classes we should be trying to pass. You don’t need me to recount all the anecdotes you’ve heard about shoe salesmen in Africa or doing what you love by loving what you do…but they’re true. And they focus on our reactions to our circumstances.
Enjoy your job more in 2020 by reacting better to your job.
React better to your job by seeing your circumstances more clearly.
See your circumstances more clearly, more frequently by building a culture that helps foster greater awareness.