The Work You Love and the Threat of the Black Hole

So many people in the U.S. are unhappy in their jobs. They drag themselves to work on Monday and all week look forward to Friday and the weekend. Perhaps you’re one of them. If so, I suspect that off and on (maybe daily) you’ve wondered if there is something else you could do—that dream job that a few fortunate people find. You know the one. It’s the job that doesn’t feel like work. The one where someone has to tell you to go home because you’re having so much fun and don’t want to leave. I don’t claim to have all the answers, but would like to share three things that come from Dan Miller’s book, 48 Days to the Work You Love that might help—they helped me a great deal.

.

There are a few articles devoted to reviewing the book so I won’t go into detail except to revisit one very important and powerful insight. Dan makes the case that there is a profound difference among three related aspects of our work. Our calling is our motivation, the thing we were meant to do that is closely related to who we are. This is the thing that flows out of us no matter what kind of occupation we are engaged in. For example, I have a gift or a calling of teaching. And, although I’ve worked in many jobs and professions, I always ended up teaching in one manner or another. Next, Dan calls our attention to our career. Your career is the broad field of work you have chosen to express your calling in. In my case, it is higher education. I’ve had a calling of teaching since I was very young but have expressed that through several different careers. Right now it is primarily higher education but I’m actively working on transitioning to another expression of my calling–another career!

Finally, Dan writes about our job, that specific thing we do within our career. For me, that is the specific department and role I work within in one specific university. The differences among these three helped me begin the process to change careers in such a way that I could continue to express my calling while I manage the change processes. Hope that helps you as well.

Second, I’m convinced we move through seasons in our lives. Again, it can help us manage the movement toward a new career if we understand this. For example, I was very comfortable teaching high school mathematics when I was a lot  younger but moved into a season where I needed to grow outside of that job and career. Although I settled into several careers after that, I’m once again at the transition from one season to another. It helps to understand the concept of life seasons and cooperate with and manage the change instead of fighting it.

Image by AFP/Getty Images via Daylife

Third, and last, I’ve found that as I’ve moved through this transition phase several times in my life now, the process is a lot like circling around the edge of a black hole. Give me a minute and I’ll try to make some sense out of this analogy.

Now, no one wants to get sucked into a black hole. As you struggle with the job you hate, you may feel as if you are circling the event horizon of a black hole. You’re at that edge where you could go either way. You could get sucked into the hole and demolished or you could escape to the freedom beyond the black hole. You fight the pull into the drudgery and depression of the hole and yearn to escape. The problem is, you can’t just escape from, you have to be able to escape to. You can’t walk away from an income and your responsibilities just because you don’t like the hole.  Without a direction, it’s hard to escape a black hole. But you keep hoping and wishing and turn as much attention as possible “out there,” always looking away from the black hole and wishing to escape. But black holes may not be so bad.

In fact, there is some theoretical support for the belief that black holes are portals into other universes (e.g., the worm holes in Deep Space Nine and other Star Trek universes). How ironic that the way of escape into a new universe may be through that which we are sick of and wish to get away from. And that’s how it has worked for me as a pattern of change from one season to the next.

I circle around the black hole (current career and job) but too often look only to “outer space” where I think my future lies. I pine and daydream about flitting off to other galaxies and finding planets full of happiness away from the black hole. I circle around and around at the event horizon, never seeming to get any farther away from the hole. As I circle and look outward, I can’t seem to see where to go, can’t find a destination “out there.” However, on some of those passes, I begin to see the familiar things that are intricate parts of this existence in different ways. The things I already do, some of which I love to do, begin to get hooked up with other things that I’ve come across on this career or job. As I glance back at the hole and begin to look at things differently, in new combinations and with fresh additions, I end up diving deeper into the very core of what I’ve wanted to escape because the familiar has merged with new insights and become fresh and exciting, no longer what it once was.  I begin to see a new way to express my calling and pop through this career and job into a new life on the other side. Kind of a strange idea, but I’ve not only seen this happen before, it’s happening to me right now.

That’s it. I’ve tried to point you to an outstanding book and then two off-the-wall kinds of thoughts that have helped me. Hope you find your way through and into the work you love.