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Society kind of tends to be selfish. But just because it tends to be that way doesn’t mean it’s right. So, I challenge you to be a giver. Be someone who’s willing to go above and beyond and to help others without expectation of getting a return. I promise you; it’s going to be so much happier in life.

Hello, and welcome to The Career Shake Up Podcast. I’m your host, Kristin Szalajko. I’m a certified professional career coach who specializes in career exploration. I believe everyone deserves a meaningful career they love. I know it can be hard to find that career, and that’s why I’m here. I’ve developed an easy formula to help you identify the right career path for you. Let’s shake up the way you view your career. I’m going to challenge you to look at careers in a brand-new way. Whether you’re stuck in a job you don’t like or just starting out on your path, my goal is to empower you to take control of your career.

[00:59]

Hello. Welcome back. All right. We are diving in on the key elements to a happy career. And right now, we’re on the fourth key element, which is making a difference, feeling like you make a difference in the world.

So, if we’re being really honest with ourselves, true happiness comes when we look outside of ourselves and we feel like we’re making a difference. You’ll have to forgive me for a moment if you are not religious, but religion is a huge part of where I am. But there’s a scripture in the New Testament. It’s in Mark 8: 35. It says,

“Whosoever will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. “

Obviously, this applies to the church and service, but it really applies to our entire life. When we lose us and stop focusing on ourselves and are focusing on others around us and trying to make a difference, suddenly we feel happier. And the more self-absorbed we become the less happy we are. We tend to have a very selfish society, right? That’s all about us. Think about ourselves, fill your own cup and of course we should take care of ourselves, but we need to look outside ourselves, selves and be more kind, be more serving and as we do that we’ll find far more happiness in our life.

It’s possible that you have a lot of that happening outside of work and you don’t necessarily have to fill that need for service and love and making a difference at work. It could be happening outside of work but if it’s not, you know, it needs to be a part of your day job and there’s a few different ways that we can do this. I’m going to give you some options about how you can serve at work. One is to serve directly, which in some fields that’s very obvious, right? If you’re a firefighter, if you’re a doctor, if you’re a teacher, maybe you’re a lawyer and you help clients with let’s say you’re a divorce lawyer and you’re helping clients, you’re trying to make a difference in their life. Some of those are very obvious, right? They’re clear that you work to serve and help others. Hospitality, that’s another good example.

Well, some jobs aren’t so like that, right? Mine, for example, I am a paralegal for commercial real estate investment trust, and I handle evictions and bankruptcies. I don’t feel like I’m making a difference when it comes to my direct work but there are plenty of other ways in my work.

One of those is by serving your fellow employees. What are you doing at work? What are your options at work? Do you see opportunities where you can help others around you? Maybe you’re really quick at your job and you’re getting your tasks done often and you kind of sitting around totally in your thumbs. You could either use that time to surf the Internet or you could find other employees who could use somebody to help take off some of the weight on their plate.

Maybe there’s some newer people, there some people that are like lower on the ladder than you that could use some mentorship. Maybe that’s it. Maybe you’re taking colleagues out to lunch, just developing relationships, just finding ways to work that you can feel like you’re making a difference. That can make all the difference in the world. You don’t have to change the world through your job. You may just have to change one person, right? Just having a positive impact on a few people around you.

[04:26]

Another way you could do this is by working for a company that stands for something. A lot of companies take these public stands on causes that they’re fighting against and maybe that’s important to you and you want to be involved in a company that’s working towards a good cause. A good example of this is doTERRA. They are an essential oil company. They’re actually based in Utah where I am. But they take a huge stand against human trafficking, which is a very tragic, sad problem in the United States – the world, actually. But they work to fight against that. And so, if working at doTERRA Corporate matters to you because you feel like that’s going to make a difference with human trafficking, that’s it. That can check that box for you.

Another way you can do this at work is by service opportunities. Maybe you work for a company who volunteers. So, I don’t get to do this anymore, which I’m kind of sad about. So now I’m in Utah but the company I work for is in Florida. Everyone is there except for me. I’m like the odd man out. But we used to volunteer at the Royal McDonald’s House. Actually, they still do. I just don’t get to because I’m not there. But once a quarter, we would volunteer at the Ronald McDonald House, and we would make a meal for the families there. For those of you who don’t know what a Ronald McDonald’s house is, when there are sick kids that are in the hospital with chronic diseases or cancer or something like that, families are spending a lot of time at the hospital, and carting back and forth between home is really taxing. And so, Ronald McDonald House builds these houses, these community homes right next to our near hospitals, so the families can stay at the house for free. Meals are provided to them for free, and they get their housing. It’s just to ease the burden of housing when they’re worrying about going back and forth for their child. It’s an excellent cause. But we would volunteer, and we’d come at lunch, and we’d make these meals and serve the families there. And that felt really good and that, you know, kind of check the box. I’m like I’m not necessarily making a difference in my day to day, but I get these opportunities to volunteer and to make a difference in other people’s lives. And my company lets me, right? They pay me to go to the Ronald McDonald House and do this and that’s awesome. I mean, you can’t not feel good while you’re doing that, right?

So, another way we can do this is we could choose to earn, to give. What I mean by that is maybe you commit to getting a high paying job strictly so that you can donate and give back. Let’s say I’m going to donate 10% of my time to other causes that matter. I’m going to volunteer at a homeless shelter or the food bank or some other cause that’s around. Or I make a lot and I’m going to commit to donate 10% of my income to charity. There are some causes that really matter to me and that’s what I’m going to do. And if you do that, you’ll really start to feel like you’re making a difference in the world.

You can also advocate to any social causes that matter to you. This is sort of similar to working for a company that stands for something. Maybe there’s something you’re really passionate about, like a particular religion or diseases that you want to see eradicated, environmental causes, social injustices, social causes. Maybe there’s something like that that you could get involved in, whether that’s directly or working through a company that helps propel those movements forward. So maybe ask yourself are there any particularly social causes or injustices that I’m really passionate about that I want to make a difference on? And if so, that might be something to look into.

[08:10]

Another way that we can make a difference is through research, right? Maybe focusing on solving problems and pressing needs. So again, we could solve like social causes, problems that affect the world, like hunger. But there could be other ways that we are solving problems.

Maybe we’re just inventors inventing things that make people’s lives easier and that helps us feel like we’re making a difference in someone’s life. And so, there are various ways that we could do that, but that’s something you can consider.

As I said earlier, I mentioned that society kind of tends to be selfish. But just because it tends to be that way doesn’t mean it’s right. So, I challenge you to be a giver. Be someone who’s willing to go above and beyond and to help others without expectation of getting a return. I promise you it’s going to be so much happier in life. There are two books that I recommend you read on this topic. One is the Go Giver. Erick Cuentas, who I interviewed on a few episodes ago, he actually recommended this book to me. I read it. It was really good. It’s a short read. It’s actually a pretty easy read. It’s by Bob Berg and John David Mann. I’ll link to it up in the show notes. It just talks to you about how the way to succeed is really by just by constantly giving and looking for opportunities to give without expectation of return.

Another good one is Give and Take. This is a book by Adam Grant and this one is fascinating. It’s a bit longer of a read, but good. I feel like all of Adam Grant’s reads are good, but they’re definitely a little more intellectual. But the premises is basically when they look at people who are successful, givers usually end up like a little sandwich. They’re the very bottom or the very top of success. There’s the bottom of success and they tend to give more than they can and they’re burning out and they’re letting people take advantage of them. That’s a whole different level. But real givers, people that give and are working hard to make a difference in people’s lives and not burning out, those people are on the top. And people that are takers or matches as he calls them, people that… I’ll give, but only because you gave and I feel like I have to meet… match what you did for me. Or I’m going to give but I expect return. Those people tend to end up in the middle. And so, both are great books and I highly encourage you to read those.

So, another thing you can do is just to give others credit. Give others credit where it’s due. My mother-in-law has recently switched jobs, and one of the jobs that she left was because people were consistently taking credit for her work. And it’s not necessarily that she was trying to be selfish and like, hey, you need to acknowledge that I’m here and I’m great. But it was, I’m working really hard and these people are taking advantage of me. Somebody else is climbing the ladder on my back, you know, climbing onto my shoulders, taking credit, my work. And, you know, nobody wants to do that. Don’t be that person. Give credit where credit is due. Build others up. Cheer for somebody else’s success. Doing so will not cut you down and will not hold you back. It’s just going to make you a greater person. And in the end, in the long run, you’re succeed much better.

Well, that’s all I have for you today, so join us again next week as we continue down the key elements. There are two left, so we’re almost done with the six key elements. You can find the show notes at kristinszalajko.com/episode 9. I’m going to have on there a PDF for you that you can download. It’s all about the key elements. So, there are six key elements to our happiness, and this is a part of the overall formula for how to find a happy career. But right now, we’re just talking about the key elements. And if you’ll download that and then listen to each of the episodes on the key elements, it’s really going to help you identify what you need to be happy. So, it’ll kind of explain what the key elements are and then give you questions, like self-reflection questions, you can ask yourself to kind of figure out what it is you’re looking for in each of these key elements. Once you figure those out for you, then you can move forward and start narrowing down jobs. You can start testing jobs, and then you can move forward and make an actual career plan. So, this is sort of your springboard, your starting point to finding a good career. So, I encourage you to go on there and download that so that you can get started and follow along with us.

All right, thank you so much for joining us today.

[Outro]

Thank you for joining me today. I hope you found value as you listened. If there’s anyone you feel can use this episode, please go ahead and share it with them. Also, you’re likely listening to this on the go. When you find a quiet moment, could you be so kind as to leave me a review? That will help others find me as well? Be sure to come back next week for the next episode time, same place. Have a great week.