In recent months, I have given several presentations in our Old Saybrook and Madison offices on the importance of gratitude. Indeed Career Path of Abundance opens with a section on gratitude. In relation to career change, my sense of gratitude stems from an expansive view of the human condition. Based on both examining the rest of the world and human history, I have found it abundantly clear that we are beyond lucky in our ability to choose our career paths.
I took a Great Course – audio lectures from top college professors – that discussed ordinary people in ancient times. For example, the subject of study would not be Julius Caesar but Caesar’s chariot driver and others “in the crowd” of the Coliseum. If you were born back then, you were pretty much destined to a single career. Throughout much of the world, career mobility is still limited.
Some lessons:
(1) We should all be happy that we live now and that we live in a place like Connecticut as both allow for career choice in ways that the rest of time and the rest of the world do not.
(2) Our forefathers and foremothers would exhort us to use the most of our freedom. Imagine bringing a benevolent ancestor back from as little as 300 years ago who lived in some type of European feudal society where career transition would require massive effort and risk. He/she would urge you to craft your career.
Within some limits, you can craft your career. Why would you waste that opportunity?
I took a Great Course – audio lectures from top college professors – that discussed ordinary people in ancient times. For example, the subject of study would not be Julius Caesar but Caesar’s chariot driver and others “in the crowd” of the Coliseum. If you were born back then, you were pretty much destined to a single career. Throughout much of the world, career mobility is still limited.
Some lessons:
(1) We should all be happy that we live now and that we live in a place like Connecticut as both allow for career choice in ways that the rest of time and the rest of the world do not.
(2) Our forefathers and foremothers would exhort us to use the most of our freedom. Imagine bringing a benevolent ancestor back from as little as 300 years ago who lived in some type of European feudal society where career transition would require massive effort and risk. He/she would urge you to craft your career.
Within some limits, you can craft your career. Why would you waste that opportunity?