To lead a fulfilling life, you need to keep growing and challenging yourself at every stage of your life. Frank Mackey exemplifies that philosophy. The 60-something Mackey just gave up a successful law practice in Little Rock, Arkansas, to pursue an acting career in Chicago.
This isn't his first career change, and it may not be his last. His previous vocational hats also include sales, marketing, human resources and business management.
He also preaches what he practices. One of the most liberating career moments for Mackey's son came with his father's recommendation that he "stop trying to choose for life and start thinking in five-year increments." From that day forward, the younger Mackey felt free to pursue careers on the stock exchange, in business management and in real estate.
You may not feel you can afford the luxury of experimenting with a variety of vocations-especially when change involves shedding hard-earned credentials and roles. But, as goes a saying, "You can't put a price tag on loving your work."
If you're approaching midlife, don't be surprised to discover that your values and needs may be changing. To help you get in touch with some of those deeper yearnings, do what Englewood, Colorado, career counselor Linda Bougie calls the "epitaph exercise." Ask yourself what, at the end of your life, you'd want to be remembered for.
Don't be surprised if your answer is at odds with how you've been living. Most people who do this exercise talk less about achievements and more about connections with others.
"The question is a wake-up call that helps people get in touch with basic or forgotten values," Bougie says.
Another way to determine your values is to try the game Rick Ehlers likes to play with participants in his outplacement workshops.
"Pretend you won the lottery," he tells them. "You can do anything you want with the money. The one stipulation is that you have to work. What would you choose to do?"
Take a Personal Survey
Most people don't know enough about all their available options to make informed career decisions. To remedy that deficit, you'll need to do some market research:
- Start by making a general list of your personal and professional interests. Don't omit any options because of preconceived notions about a field or industry.
- Write down your number one interest, then consider it carefully. What is it about that area that most fascinates you? For example, a woman who loves cooking realized she's particularly drawn to desserts because they appeal to both her sense of artistry and her sweet tooth.
- Explore your interest more deeply, by researching:
-Companies that produce related products or services.
-Schools that teach related skills.
-Types of jobs related to your interest.
-Names of specific people who work in the field.
- Set up an action plan-complete with realistic goals and timetables-to meet (or at least talk on the phone with) the players in your targeted interest area. In your discussions, try to learn as much as possible about what these professionals are doing. Also ask for referrals to people working in related fields. After each meeting, take careful notes to consolidate your learning, then set new exploration goals.
- Once you've completed your research, listen to your gut. Does pursuing your targeted field still seem to be an exciting idea? If so, figure out what steps you'll have to take to become a qualified candidate in that field.
- If your answer is a more cautious "maybe," determine what else you need to know to make an informed career decision. Then, make it your goal to get that data.
- If you decide that your top interest doesn't translate into vi-able career options, return to your list to determine your second, third and even fourth choices. Then, repeat the exploratory process until you find a promising direction.
- If you're still undecided after several rounds of this process, think more creatively about ways to combine your interests. The prospective pastry chef, for example, had a seemingly conflicting interest in weight management. By tying her two interests together, she developed a specialty in low-fat desserts.
Many participants find they want to add something of value to the world: One wanted to build a golf course in the inner city. Another wanted to create a foundation to promote good works.
Others go for adventure and travel. In their imaginations, they became tour guides to the Orient, Middle East or Africa. Or, combining adventure and service, they consider becoming a missionary in Peru, a public-health nurse in West Africa or a teacher in Bosnia.
Freedom ranked high on the list of desires. Very few people expressed a desire to work for someone else, although many were interested in public service. Almost no one continued in the same line of work. Muriel and John James, the mother-son team who wrote A Passion For Life (1991, New York: Penguin Books) call these desires "a hunger of the soul searching for more."
However liberating it would be, most of us will never clean up in the lottery. Still, we wonder if it's really necessary, financial considerations notwithstanding, to live so far from the heart of your desires. To put moneymaking above all other needs and goals. To abandon the things you love and care about to make a living.
Hearkening back to Cheryl Heisler's story, her experimentation with a variety of work roles and her willingness to learn from each experience enabled her to make a unique and meaningful career choice. To do the same, you may have to move beyond the things your parents wanted for you (and needed from you).
Self-knowledge can be elusive. But more than any objective inventory of skills and interests, the ability to learn from experience is the key to self-knowledge. Putting a modern-day spin on Plato's famous statement "The unexamined life is not worth living," management theorist Warren Bennis says, "The unexamined life is impossible to live successfully."
Perhaps it's time to stop measuring success by external standards of performance and start measuring it in more qualitative terms-specifically, by your level of satisfaction and fulfillment. Time's a-wastin'. So why not use it wisely? Take some chances on your own happiness.
It might almost make you feel like a kid again.
