When you're pausing at mid-life or at mid-career, your natural tendency is to take stock. But self-reflection is only useful if you're honest about it.
At the end of the day, you need to face the person in the mirror and answer the questions, "Was I a good person today? Was I the person I want to be?"
Your Mistakes
It's natural to want to blame someone or something else for what's gone wrong. But when you take responsibility for your own life and admit your mistakes, you can learn from them.
No one is perfect and we all make mistakes. Don't beat yourself up or fall into the trap of being overly self-critical. It's what we decide to do WITH our mistakes that matters most.
When you admit your mistakes, you're showing accountability to yourself and to others. And you're showing your commitment to improve yourself and make the situation easier the next time it comes around.
Your "Job"
What do you have 100% control over? What's your "job" and what's someone else's?
When I ask those questions to a roomful of people whether they're in mid-career, between jobs, or dealing with diabetes, I will usually sense a huge shift of perspective taking place.
We sometimes spend a lot of time thinking (worrying, complaining, etc.) about what we don't have control over; things like traffic, weather and other people's actions and decisions.
Your "job" is to keep an eye on what you CAN control your attitude, your language, your perspective, what you focus on, your actions, how you treat your body and how you choose to spend your time.
When I was diagnosed with Type I diabetes, I learned a lot about how to control the diabetes by making good choices about food and exercise. I don't always do it perfectly, but getting tests done every three months keeps me honest about how I'm doing.
I don't blame my doctor or my diabetes if my test results aren't good. I take responsibility for my actions and talk to her about how I can do better over the next three months.
Self-employment is another great opportunity for honesty. When I first started out, I thought I could everything myself, and proceeded to do that.
When I finally got honest with myself, I saw that I was unhappy doing certain things, I didn't do them particularly well, and it was costing me more time and energy than it would cost to hire someone else.
I had to be honest about what I was good at, what I wasn't, and that I needed help. That was the hardest part, asking for help.
Like so many of us, I thought that if I needed help it meant that I was weak or flawed. Now, it's second nature.
As a reward of my 100% honesty, I now get to focus on doing just what I love doing, and I give other people the opportunity to do what they love doing.
Shawn Shepheard, 2007.
Shawn Shepheard has worked extensively in the career development field, including recruitment, customer service, career management and leadership training. He is also a celebrated inspirational speaker and an active volunteer for the Canadian Diabetes Association.
Visit http://www.shawnshepheard.com to inspire the audience at your next group event.
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