In my last blog post, I wrote about the essential first step of any heroic journey: admitting that you have no idea where to go next.

Simply accepting this reality can open up a lot of new possibilities, and a way forward often emerges naturally if you accept it for long enough.

But what if it doesn’t? What if you’ve let yourself off the hook for knowing what to do and waited patiently but your path still isn’t getting any clearer? How can you find a way to bridge the seemingly unbridgeable chasm of the unknown?

In the case of career change, the long answer is that you can work your way through a 5-step process I developed that gives you pragmatic ways to identify your superpowers, passion, and purpose; discover diverse possibilities; and explore so you know which one to choose.  It’s a powerful process, but I have to be honest: there is a shortcut.

I don’t tell many people about this shortcut because most wouldn’t want to take it even if they could.

It requires giving up control (or the illusion of control, as my 12-step friends would correct me, and they’d be right). It also requires a somewhat advanced familiarity with your Inner Wisdom and a trust in the world that I know from personal experience is hard to come by.

But you can only get familiarity and trust with practice, and the only way to practice is to make many messy attempts, so here it is, the only question you need to ask to find your calling:

What wants to happen?

The beauty of this question is that it addresses not only what you want, which is incredibly powerful in and of itself, but also what the world needs, and therefore what’s possible and practical. (There’s another benefit as well, which I’ll get to in a minute.)

Here’s how to do it:

1.    Listen In

Ask the question, get really quiet, and see what words, images, or ideas arise, paying close attention to how your head, heart, and body respond to each. You might also consider different possibilities and see which feel most aligned with your Inner Wisdom.

2.    Act

Follow through on the ideas that bring up the most positive head, heart, and body responses or to which your Inner Wisdom says yes. Know that these actions are valuable experiments and will help you find your way regardless of what results.

3.    Listen Out

Observe the results of your actions and then reflect: How did that go? Which actions created energy in you and in others? Which gave you satisfying outcomes? Which took on a momentum or life of their own?

The answers to these questions can help you identify what wants to happen in the world—in other words where there’s a need your gifts can meet, a problem your creativity can solve, or a way to work with reality rather than fight against it.

4.    Listen In Again

Ask what wants to happen again, but this time in light of what you found in step #3. If you’re not sure, try making a list of all possible options, then feeling into which bring up a sense of energy, ease, or excitement.

Act on those and then repeat the process.

I first tried using this question two years ago, with surprising results.

At the time, I had lots of goals and ideas about growing my coaching business. The problem was, no matter how hard I worked or what I tried, my business seemed to stay about the same size. In the meantime, the stress from striving so hard and failing to meet my objectives was weighing on me and beginning to trigger my anxiety and depression.

At some point it occurred to me that I might enjoy my life a lot more if I got curious about how big my business wanted to be instead of fighting an uphill battle to try to make it the size that I wanted. So I asked the question: what wants to happen with my business? And then I listened for the actions that felt energizing and satisfying and didn’t force myself to do the ones that weren’t.

It was scary, I’ll admit. I worried that my business would want to be so small that it wouldn’t generate enough income. But I’d developed enough trust in myself and the world by that point to know that if that were the case, I could find other ways to make money.

As it turned out, I didn’t need to, as that ended up being my best year to date, both in terms of how I felt and the money that I made.

But there’s one more reason this question is a useful one:

By its nature, it’s an antidote to anxiety.

When we’re anxious, it’s usually because there’s an outcome we want (to run a successful project, for example, or to land a particular job). At the same time, we sense on some level that we don’t have enough control to guarantee that this outcome occurs.

This gap between what we want and what we have power over is what generates anxiety.

Asking what wants to happen is a way of letting go of our death grip on the particular outcomes we desire, or more accurately, the specific ways we think that our happiness is going to be achieved. We get to see that a successful project, a particular job, or even a bigger business are not the only things that can support our well-being.

In fact, with enough practice, we come to understand that there are many ways to take care of ourselves and find what we’re looking for in any situation, so we don’t have to hold too tightly to any one of them.

As the list of desirable possibilities expands, the anxiety gap shrinks.

And as I said in my previous post, we don’t even have to know what all those possibilities are, because when we ask what wants to happen, we invite the world to reveal to us the best one for our current situation, and it’s often even better than what we had in mind.

Want help finding your own answers?

Pathfinders Group Coaching, one of my most powerful and cost-effective programs, is still open for enrollment.

Designed for people who want to identify the work they’re meant to do in the world and start actually doing it, Pathfinders guides you through a 5-step process for finding your calling and helps you build the skills you need clarify what wants to happen, all alongside a group of supportive, insightful peers who are going through the same thing you are.

If that sounds good, then click here to schedule a brief, no-obligation call to learn how the program works and find out if it’s for you.

School teaches many things, but in 13 years most of us learn almost nothing about how to live a fulfilling life.

We’re not taught how to identify what’s most important to us or be true to our deepest desires in a dynamic and imperfect world. We’re not taught how to make difficult decisions with complex and unknown variables. And we’re not taught how to recognize when we’re getting in our own way or what to do about it.

So it makes sense that according to Gallup, over two thirds or US workers report feeling unengaged (defined as not being involved in, enthusiastic about and committed to their work).

Most of the work that I do with clients is helping them learn the skills that school didn’t teach so that they can identify what type of work would be fulfilling and make their way through the quite challenging but also very rewarding process of moving into it.

I understand, however, that not everyone is in a position to hire a coach right now, so I thought I’d share the one practice that I consistently see making the biggest difference in my clients’ lives.

Before I share what it is, I’d like to say a few more words about why it’s so important.

The Magic Bullet? (No, But Not Too Far From It)

When my clients begin doing this practice, most of them uncover some pretty huge clues about what matters most to them, as well as what type of work they want to do next.

Even some clients who feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of options they have, and others who have no idea what would possibly fulfill them, find that this activity makes it much easier to know in which direction they want to go.

I had one client, for example, who had so many interests that he didn’t know how to choose among them. Through this activity, he discovered that it was most important to him to have some element of entertainment in his next job so that he could make others laugh and feel good about themselves. That realization led him to explore clowning, improv, and corporate teambuilding options.

But the great thing about this practice is that it not only makes it about a million times easier to identify your calling; it also helps you feel more alert, more aware, and more in control—in other words, more connected to yourself. It helps you deal with stress more effectively, and manage your emotions more skillfully. Finally, it lets you know what levers you can pull to find more joy and satisfaction in your day-to-day, in work and outside of it.

I had another client, for example, who was motivated by this practice to stop drinking in bars so much so he could do more of the things he enjoyed, like running races with his friends and daughters.

When I began doing this activity on a daily basis, I was mired in depression and having regular panic attacks. After a few weeks, I was still panicky and depressed, but I had a much better sense of what I needed to do to feel better. Over the next few years, as I continued to work this practice into my daily routine, it helped me heal my anxiety and depression, take bold steps towards my deepest desires, and rediscover my creative talents.

How does one activity do all this?

 Moving the Thermostat Indoors

This practice, and several variations on it that can also be used, are so powerful because they close the feedback loop.

Most of us are so busy running around taking care of what we need to do that we don’t take the time to check in with the impact of all this activity—or, more specifically, its impact on us (most of us are very aware of the external results, and whether or not we’re achieving the outcomes we want).

A meditation teacher of mine one time explained this phenomenon as being similar to having a house whose thermostat is outdoors. When we don’t take time to check in with ourselves and how we’re doing, the feedback loop is broken and the thermostat can’t know whether the air needs to be cooler or warmer in the house.

The activity I’m about to share is one very powerful way to close the feedback loop (or, in the metaphor used by my meditation teacher, bring the thermostat indoors). It gives us the information we need to know how to adjust our systems and actions in order to take better care of our own well-being.

In my experience, when we do this—when we close the feedback loop—we begin to automatically make the adjustments that we need most in our work and our lives, often without even thinking about it.

So, Without Further Ado…

What is the practice? It’s actually quite simple. Perhaps even better for most of us, it’s also free and not terribly time consuming.

The idea is to pause a few times a day to reflect on what you’re feeling and why.

There are many ways to do this. The easiest way to start, in my experience, is to identify three times every day when you can take a few minutes to ask yourself two questions. I recommend either doing it before a regular activity (like eating) or setting an alarm or reminder on your phone to prompt you until you get in the habit of it.

When the time comes, pause whatever you’re doing and take a few deep breaths. Then ask yourself:

• How am I feeling right now?
• What’s my best sense of why I might be feeling this way?

I recommend taking brief notes so you can begin to notice patterns.

Your feelings contain powerful clues about what you want, what’s important to you, and what’s key to your well-being. Getting curious about your emotions and what’s contributing to them will give you lots of incredibly valuable information about your work and your life.

If, like most of us, your emotional vocabulary is limited to “fine,” “good,” and “bad,” then print out Nonviolent Communication’s list of feelings and consult it when you do this.

And if you’re not sure why you’re feeling a certain way, don’t worry about it. I find that it’s extremely helpful to ask the question, but that it doesn’t matter so much if you don’t get an answer every single time. With enough repetition, you’ll start to see patterns, and what’s most important will be revealed if you just keep asking.

One final word of warning: please don’t do this practice as a way to get rid of your feelings. Paradoxically, listening to our feelings can help them move through us instead of getting stuck on repeat, but in order to listen to them, you have to be willing to embrace them with compassion and a bit of loving kindness.

 For Those Who Want More…

Once you’ve incorporated this practice into your daily habits, if you’d like to go deeper, you can add a third question between the first two:

• How does my body feel?

Scan your body to answer this question and use sensation words like “light,” “heavy,” “warm,” “cool,” “tense,” “relaxed,” “tingling,” “prickly,” “energized,” “tired,” etc.

Finally, one of the other most powerful practices I personally use is a natural offshoot to this one, and that’s to set aside time each day to let yourself feel and express your feelings. Beyond identifying, this means sitting with the emotions (perhaps in meditation), taking time to feel them in the body, or doing things that express them (like crying, yelling, hitting pillows, etc.).

Feelings we don’t feel get stuck, but when we find ways to be with them and move their energy through us, they stop leaking out in our daily lives as irritation, impatience, and anxiety.

Instead, they simply move over and through us like waves on the ocean. And these waves whisper words of guidance to us as they go, if we’re only willing to pay attention and get curious as to what they have to say.

For Those Who Want Even More…

I’m now offering a new way to get the guidance and structure you need to move into meaningful work you love.

Passion Quest: 5 Steps to Find Your Calling in a Fear-Based World, the online course I ran last year, is now available for self-study. It’s a comprehensive program with videos, downloadable PDFs, and supportive emails to help you work through the same process I use with my individual coaching clients. This is the first time that you can access it anytime, anywhere, and work through it at your own pace.

Because I want this material to be as accessible as possible, I’m offering it now at a super special rate (almost half the price of what I charged for the live version, and a small fraction of the cost of individual coaching). You can check it out here if you’re interested.

Over to You

If you try the feelings check-in, I’d love to hear how it goes for you.

What went well?
What did you learn?
What was challenging, and what questions do you have?

Any new practice is going to have its high and low points. I’d love to hear yours in the comments below.

Ant Rozetsky

If you still aren’t doing work you love, you’ve probably developed a good story about what you’re missing in order to explain why that is.

Maybe it’s that you don’t have enough time, money, or energy to find work you’d enjoy. Perhaps it’s that you don’t have the right skills and experience, or access to the right opportunities or people. Or maybe the story is that you’re too flighty, too depressed, too unfocused, too fearful, too timid, too passionate, or not passionate enough to make a successful transition.

The only reason I say this (or know it in the first place), is because I do it myself all the time. In fact, it’s quite human to come up with these stories. It’s our analytic brain trying to be helpful by pinpointing where we are, where we want to be, and what it thinks we need to get there.

The trouble is, the things we lack are often not easy to come by. Thus, rather than empowering us to make the change we seek, these stories become road blocks that reinforce the unhelpful belief that it’s impossible—or at least extremely difficult—to find what we’re looking for.

But the most interesting thing about these stories isn’t that they tend to backfire on us—it’s that they’re actually untrue. I’ve seen how, over and over again, when I reach a goal and reflect back on the process, that what I thought was missing wasn’t, and what I expected to get in my way didn’t after all.

That’s because there’s really only one thing we need to find what we’re looking for, no matter how difficult or improbable it is.

What you need to be successful

There’s no one thing “out there” in the world outside of yourself (an idea, friend, or opportunity, for example) that’s the key to your success. In fact, there are many ideas, friends, and opportunities that could help you find your way to what you’re looking for.

There’s also no one way you need to be. I’ve met tons of people who have found their calling, many of whom were flighty, unfocused, depressed, fearful, timid and/or overly or “under-ly” passionate. Some didn’t have the skills or experience they needed at first and had to acquire them. Most were quite busy with lots of responsibilities, and just about none of them had as much money or energy as they thought they needed when they started.

What all of these people did need in order to find work they loved was confidence. Given that success is really about conducting enough experiments (and failing enough times) to find out what works for you, confidence is key.

Confidence is what helps you feel empowered enough to commit to a goal that you know is a stretch in the first place. It allows you to stick with your intentions and find your way around obstacles that appear impassable at first glance. It sustains your efforts to seek any external resources you may need and bolsters your ability to tap into your internal strength and capabilities.

What confidence is (and isn’t)

So yes, confidence is a must-have if you’re going to find work you love, but don’t panic quite yet. The most important thing to know about confidence is that you already have it, even if you feel like the most insecure person on the planet right now.

When I use the word “confidence”, I’m not talking about bravado or some sort of god-given ability to convince the world that you’re the bee’s knees. I’m not talking about believing that you’re better than anyone else, or that things are always going to turn out exactly according to your plan. I’m also not talking about the ability to smoothly sell yourself to others or to stay cool, calm, and collected around potential mates.

The confidence that I’m talking about is actually summed up quite well on Dictionary.com, which defines it as “full trust” and “a belief in one’s powers and abilities.” I really like this definition because it doesn’t say “belief that one’s abilities are the best ever” or “belief that one is perfect and without flaws.” Everyone has access to confidence because we all have the ability to trust, and we all get to choose what we believe.

So to find our confidence, all we need to do is be willing to believe that who we are and what we’re capable of doing—while imperfect—are enough.

How to be more confident

Years ago, when I first learned about the importance of confidence in everything from dating to test-taking, I tried to talk myself into feeling better about myself. It didn’t work. Confidence isn’t something you can force, fake, or even create. What’s worse, when my efforts floundered, I felt even more insecure because my lack of self-assuredness now felt like a failure (talk about a vicious cycle).

What I’ve learned since then is that confidence isn’t an all-or-nothing game.

Brene Brown asserts that courage isn’t something we either have or don’t, but rather is a quality that we can all develop through intentional practice. Confidence is similar. We all have access to it, and though we can’t manufacture it, we can nurture it with conscious cultivation. And just as courage doesn’t require an absence of fear, confidence doesn’t require an absence of doubt. You can have doubts and still choose to believe in your own capabilities.

Here are 3 powerful ways you can cultivate your own confidence in daily life.

1. Take action (any action).

It can be hard to believe something without evidence, but once you see it for yourself, it’s a lot harder to deny. That’s why action builds confidence: it gives you the chance to see your talents and power in practice.

If you’re not sure what to do, pick something small that can move you towards your goal. It might be trying out an exercise I’ve offered to help clarify your passion, signing up for a class in something you don’t yet know how to do, or finding someone to interview about a job you might be interested in. It doesn’t really matter what it is so long as it takes you closer to your goal. And if you’re feeling overwhelmed, then break it down into the smallest step you can possibly imagine.

Whatever you choose, the important thing is to do it. Then, after celebrating your accomplishment, take another small step. Then another and another.

Over time, even if all of your small steps aren’t successful, a lot of them will be. This will give you evidence of your capabilities, which is one of confidence’s favorite foods.

2. Change your focus.

If you were seeing everything you do clearly and without bias, you would be blown away by your abilities. It never ceases to amaze me how incredibly talented all my clients are, and how consistently they fail to recognize these capabilities themselves.

It all comes down to what you pay attention to. If you focus on what skills you don’t have, what you don’t know, or what you haven’t done, you’ll be hard-pressed to feel confident about future prospects. But if you can start to finally acknowledge all your accomplishments and contributions, faith in yourself will easily follow.

One of my favorite ways to do this is with a Neverending List. All you have to do is start a list of anything you’ve accomplished, done well, or contributed to the world. Take a few minutes each day to add as many things from your current life or from your past as you can possibly come up with—at least 20, if you want to be sure you’re being thorough—no matter how small or inconsequential they may seem. If it’s hard to think of items for your list, then your standards are too high. Remember that something as simple as smiling at someone on the street can have a big impact on their day. Include anything and everything that you think might possibly qualify. Then, once a week, read through your list and really let it sink in just how amazing it is that one person actually did all these things.

3. Join a community.

When I asked for feedback from my first Pathfinders Group Coaching participants, I wasn’t sure what to expect. They reported progress in diverse areas, but one theme in particular stood out: almost everyone reported feeling an increased sense of confidence and empowerment as a result of the group.

To be honest, I’m not totally sure why that is, but it’s consistent with my own experience of community. Every time I participate in a group of peers, I feel better about myself, more confident in my abilities, and more capable of tackling whatever obstacle is at hand.

It may have to do with the fact that in community, your challenges are normalized—you get to see how other talented people are struggling with the same things you are.

It may be that you see other people similar to you succeeding, which makes it feel more doable. Or maybe it’s that you have the opportunity to make contributions to others and see your impact more easily.

Whatever it is, community seems to be a powerful shortcut to confidence. If you’re not feeling good about yourself or your prospects, find others like you and create a structure to share openly and honestly with each other. It takes effort and commitment, but it also cultivates confidence like nothing else.

The takeaway

Confidence is like a hidden power-up that can strengthen your efforts any time you choose to look for it. It unlocks all the other resources and gifts you might need to get to where you want to go.

If there’s one thing I’d like you to take from this post, it’s this: you already have everything you need to find what you’re looking for. Confidence is just about tapping into a large enough perspective to see that. And seeing things in this more honest light, you begin to realize that no matter where you are, no matter how lost or stuck or frustrated you feel, you’re already on the road to finding what you seek.

Nurture your confidence with a community of peers

If you’d like help to make the road to your calling clearer and easier to follow, I’ve got good news: I’m starting another Pathfinders Group Coaching group in the new year. I’m doing this because the current group is full, and I want more people to be able to enjoy the benefits that early participants have seen, such as (in their own words):

• “Clarity on my next steps”
• “Discovery of my strengths, skills, and passions”
• “Tools for dealing with stress, anxiety, and uncertainty”
• “Confidence to start moving forward”
• “A sense of empowerment”

To find out more about how the combination of coaching and community can help you find the clarity and confidence you need to start doing more meaningful work, click here to schedule a free, no-obligation call. This is one of the most cost-effective and powerful programs I offer, and I only have 5 spots open, so if you’re interested in learning more, please don’t wait.

Over to you

The comments function on my blog was broken, but now it’s fixed! I’d love to hear from you about what you make of all this. In particular, I’d love to know:

What helps you feel more confident? What gets in the way?

Please leave a comment below!