Delightful Work

You’ll hate this post unless you’re already enjoying your work or on the verge of that enjoyment. Why? Because I’m going to ask you to fully feel what you are feeling, and for most people, that can be very uncomfortable. But being willing to fully feel everything is the one process that separates the whiners from the winners in the game of work life freedom.

If you have the gumption to accept the following tips, you can do more to advance the enjoyment of your true calling than by using any other process.

Why? Because the willingness to feel is the thing most missing, not only for delightful work, but for robust living in your entire life. I’ll share some ways to begin feeling fully in Part Two of this post. For now, I want to make a case for what you’ll gain by feeling fully. As you read this, just be open to the possibility that everything in your life can come more easily by feeling fully.

For example, imagine receiving mail with a law firm’s return address on the envelope. Often our first reaction is fear. Oh no! Now what have I done?! Most vibrations do not become negative emotions like apprehension, anger, sadness or disappointment until we attach a thought to them. We don’t feel fearful until we label something as potentially bad. So, in fact, we often create the fear that we avoid feeling! Isn’t that something? If we didn’t create it, it wouldn’t even exist. We always have the choice of feeling only the vibration as it passes through our body.

Feeling fully could be the practice you’re missing the most. Emancipate yourself by feeling all the time and you’ll enjoy such wonderful benefits that you’ll never return to the life you once led.

Our country’s forefathers claimed our independence from oppression by declaring our rights to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. When it comes to work, we exercise these rights by engaging in activities that bring us alive and inspire us to joyfully be who we are. So why settle for less? If you’re working for someone else and feel miserable about it, what has stopped you from pursuing happiness?

Self-employment is the most direct route to uniquely expressing what you’ve been put on this earth to do. Bold self-expression, aligned with your core values, represents your best shot at fulfillment and happiness. Many of us faultily look to a job or a relationship to make us feel complete. But wholeness can’t be found by looking to another, and it most certainly isn’t found by being miserably employed.

Yes, some of us find contentment and fulfillment working for someone else, but what if you’re the type of person whose greatness can only be unleashed through the boldness of self-employment? What if you knew beyond any doubt that you have what it takes to succeed with your own big ideas, in your own way? If you knew these things to be absolute, what changes might you make today?

Admit it, the freedom of no employment or of being your own boss has always intrigued you. Deep within, you know that you have what it takes; you’re creative and big ideas come easily to you. So what stops you from starting a business or growing your existing business into the profitable and fulfilling enterprise you’ve dreamed of?

I’m going to help you answer the above questions but what will you do with these answers? By the end of this article, if you understand more clearly what stops you, are you willing to take action so it stops you no more? As a life and business coach, I work with clients who want to align their innermost values and desires with their outer actions. Yet information alone doesn’t guarantee success. How many times have you known what to do and still not done it?

The following suggestions will guide you a little closer toward your optimum path. Together we’ll go within, yank out the root of what’s holding you back then build a solid foundation for sustainable, authentic growth.

Excuses that Stop Us Short of True Liberation

The basis of most everything that stops us can be found in not trusting our intuition, which causes us to search for answers outside ourselves. Not trusting your intuition deters you from completing big ideas that are given to you directly by… of course, your inner voice. Looking for truth on the outside leads you to care too much about what others think of you, and possibly accepting their personally disparaging opinions of your ideas as gospel.

We all doubt ourselves. Yet fresh ideas come from straight from God’s heart to ours. Your recognition of an inspired idea not only means that it was meant only for you but that it’s already on its way into being. So not only can you do it, but the fact that you even see the idea proves that you’re already in the midst of manifesting it.

My friend, your happiness is a choice. It’s calling out to you and your first step in is to stop doing what stops you from claiming it. See if you can find your favorite excuse below.

“I’m waiting for the right time to make my move.” Yes, timing is relevant, but more so than not, waiting amounts to nothing more than putting your life on hold. The fact that you’ve read this far is confirmation that your time is now. Really, what are you waiting for? Trust your inner voice; then whatever you’re telling yourself won’t carry as much weight.

“What if I make a mistake and fail?” There’s no “what if” about it. You will make mistakes and even fail along the way, perhaps repeatedly. Stumbling and rising again is natural; fearing failure is pathological. If it’s going to happen regardless, why not get on with it?

“I’m going to build up my finances then go for it.” This feeds the illusion that employment = money = security = freedom = happiness. If happiness is the goal, why not go directly for it right now? How many years of uninspired slavery will it take to make you feel secure? Money movement expert Egbert Sukop says, “Quit seeing money as a means to an end, and suddenly you’ll gain the independence that you attributed to it.” Goethe said, “He only earns his freedom and his life who takes them every day by storm.”

“I love what I do, I just don’t love marketing.” Actually, this excuse has nothing to do with marketing and everything to do with a hesitance to boldly self-express. Are you sure you’re not compromising by holding back and going for a second-place dream? The only way you’ll be able to naturally and shamelessly flaunt yourself is to live a first-place dream-then others’ reactions won’t affect you.

“I’m just not sure I have what it takes.” You are enough, my friend, more than enough. That’s not you talking; it’s just your conditioning. You aren’t your past and you surely aren’t the twisted opinion of anyone else. If you allow the opinion of another to dictate your choices then whose life are you really living?

Turning Excuses into Inspired Action

Now that you know what justifications you’ve using on yourself, let’s chuck them and rebuild a structure for sustainable support, working from the inside out. Here are five powerful concepts that work for my clients. Find a way to joyfully employ all five and your stated intentions will no longer conflict with your inner voice.

Liberty is one of the truths that our forefathers found to be self-evident, yet some of you are still miserably working for someone else and cheating yourself out of the happiness of pursuing what you’re really meant to do. There is no ‘on hold’ in our Declaration of Independence or Bill of Rights. It is your unalienable right to express yourself through self-employment, and your time to do so is now.

Ever been so stuck that you couldn’t see a way out? Even when stuck, we always have an optimum path to choose. If we can see it in hindsight, we could have seen it in foresight. There’s always one choice that will work best to get moving again. But how do we to find it? What’s the best way to find our optimum path when we are desperately stuck?

In 1997, I lost a business, my home, my marriage and, just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, I ran over my daughter’s kitten.

For a couple days I raged from anger to sadness to every color of guilt and back. I was not yet a life coach, and I didn’t have the perspective to realize what was happening. Plain and simple, I was stuck in a deep hole. And I hated it.

When we sink that deep, it seems like the light will never shine again. If that’s you right now, then I feel for you. But is it time to quit wallowing in self-pity and start moving?. Of course, with my situation, my light did shine again. I want to share with you the lesson I learned during those dark days.

Movement works… any movement. Get up, get out and get moving! Do something differently. Anything! What did I do? I marched into the woods and played Little John by beating dead trees until I was emotionally and physically spent. That released my anger. Then I boldly marched back and forth while singing about where I was headed. It was the lift I needed to see things differently.

Any movement, even physical movement, works because it changes one’s perspective. If you’re looking from a different vantage point, you’ll soon be able to see new opportunities to which you were once blind.

Begin by walking to a hilltop or any expansive place and feel the new energy rushing into your body. Notice how your view has changed and speak about that. Out loud. Bold actions generally follow bold proclamations, and you need to be bold. You need to first stride boldly. Then you need to speak out boldly in your own name. Forget about what others want. It’s your own desire that will lift you from the pit of despair. Then naturally you’ll see an opening that just wasn’t there before.

You’ll be like the running back who keeps churning his legs because he doesn’t know when or where the opening may appear. But if he doesn’t keep moving, he’s not ready when the opening develops.

Know this. There are always five or six available options in any situation. Just keep moving with your eyes wide open until you see them. When you see more options, you can seize your optimum path. But first move your body or you’ll never see them.

Then, as you walk in bold fashion, find a bold action to take that was unavailable to you previously. Take it and realize the new consequences. Even if the action was a mistake, the realization will hold value - because you will have moved from stuck into momentum.

Momentum is energy gained by movement and it just doesn’t come from mere analyzing or planning. One must act and act boldly for new opportunities to be seen. You have an optimum path available to you right now and it will come by way of a bold action. Get moving so you can see it, and then seize it boldly and quickly before doubt comes to visit.

Really, what do you have to lose? Let go of your stale and stinking paralysis. Choose and move boldly right now and you’ll soon be blasting out of your funk.

Enthusiastically Yours,
Tom Volkar

Good morning friends. I think it’s high time that I explain exactly whom I intend to serve with this blog. It starts with my mission: to increase the number of folks on the planet in active pursuit of their work life happiness.

But who among you has the highest probability of being helped by working with me? Those who have the following characteristics have a higher probability of getting desired results with my guidance. This post is a profile of those clients who have had the most success working with me in my nine years of life coaching.

So, can you honestly say “yes” to at least four of the above eight? If you can, we can bring you up-to-speed on the others.

If the above describes you, then feel very good about yourself. You might as well stop all that self-flagellation right now. Praise yourself because you are truly magnificent! If you are ready to begin active pursuit of your true calling, then prove it.

Take the action that can save your life. This glorious path has many possible entry points. But they’ll all remain hidden unless you take action now.

Call 412-655-0872 or email me today.

Enthusiastically Yours,
Tom Volkar

Some are born with such a compelling drive that their true calling surfaces early and they pursue it their entire lives. For others, it may take decades of active pursuit.

Stumble It!

Delightful work is: amusing, attractive, captivating, clever, engaging, enjoyable, fascinating, gratifying, luscious and thrilling.

Does your work invoke any of these, or something less?

If you’re not engaged in work that you love, you have chosen less than you could have. If your career, job or business does not feel like a true calling, can you even expect it to be a delight?

Here is your wake-up call. If you aren’t in active pursuit of work life happiness, get in the game my friend. Get in the game now. Know this: each of us has a special something that can be expressed as our unique, fulfilling work. In the engagement of that work we’ll be in
service to others and financially prosperous.

Writer Frederick Buechner said it best. “Vocation is the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.”

Have you always had this hunch that you were destined for greatness? That hunch was your deep gladness calling out to you from within. Your first step is to acknowledge that whisper of greatness and declare yourself in active pursuit of your delightful work. The path needs to be your own, but you needn’t walk it alone. Let’s boldly stride out on this path together.

The mission of Delightful Work is simply to increase the number of folks on this planet who are in active pursuit of work life happiness. I’ll be your guide and together we’ll move all obstacles now standing in the way of your deep gladness.

The world has a deep need for what only you can give it. This is your time. It’s your time to stand tall and pursue what was meant for you, with honor and commitment. Author of Coaching Into Greatness, Kim George, shares this very inspiring thought. “What is meant for you can’t be lost.”

What was meant for you is still there waiting for you to give it life first by making a bold proclamation. No obstacle, real or imagined can stop you once you commit. I’ll prove it to you.

Tell me what scares you the most. What stops you from pursuing your delightful work? Really. What do you run up against when you entertain the thought of creating a happier work life? What circumstance, belief or fear has caused you to settle for less than you could enjoy?

Be bold and share, and I’ll post it here. But we’ll do far more than post it. We’ll work together with other committed adventurers to show you how to move through it in active pursuit of your deep gladness.

For you brave souls who are already enjoying work that brings you alive, what once stopped you and how did you move forward anyway?
Stumble It!