On Project Eve (a career site for women that I follow) there's an article from a few days ago by Debra Pickett on her Plan 40--a two-year plan she embarked on at age 38 to "get her sh*t together" by age 40.  I'm turning 50 next month, another big birthday, so this notion of taking stock and figuring out what isn't working and needs to change is on my mind lately. I'm planning a personal retreat to explore where I'm at and where I want to be as I head into my "Crone" years. It feels like this is a good time to take a breath, get clear, and then move again.  I'm also thinking a lot about transitional moments as I watch my Facebook feed fill up with friends sending their children off to college for the first time. For many people (especially women) this becomes another key moment to step back and see where changes need to occur in their lives.  What I've found is that there are times when we feel almost compelled to assess our situations and make some bigger changes.  Often this happens when we are experiencing a shift in our identities, like as we approach a big birthday or when we become an empty-nester. It can also occur as we head into a new season--September and January in particular seem to invite this kind of thinking. Or when we realize that things are so out of control in our lives that we have no other choice but to step back and take stock.   Regardless of the motivation, this periodic reevaluation and adjustment is important to our personal and professional growth. It's what allows us to get into better relationship with ourselves and with the people in our lives and helps us to maintain our resilience as our circumstances change.  Recognizing this call is the first important thing. The second is to actually heed it--to make the space in our lives to see where we need to get our sh*t together if we want to create the life we want. This, I've found takes courage more than anything. Courage to get clear and learn about what will have to fall away. Courage to make the changes that need to be made. The payoffs for this courage can be amazing, though. Well worth the price of admission.  So, is it time for you to get your sh*t togther?   _____________________________________________________________________ My Career Clarity Retreat on September 21 is a good place for you to start thinking about how you want to get your sh*t together.  Click here for more information and the link to register! 

Last week I had an opportunity to be on The Delco Show, an Internet radio show broadcast through Brandywine Radio. I discussed The Bamboo Project and the habits of career resilience, as well as some of the major trends we're seeing in the economy. The host, Tore Fiore, was particularly interested in the origins of the name, so if you've been wondering where the idea for "The Bamboo Project" came from, here's your chance to find out. I also share what got me focused on the issue of career resilience and doing the work that I do, as well as the different challenges that younger and mid-career people are facing. We even spent some time on reflective practice, career journaling, the power of blogging for professional development and dealing with a toxic work environment. We actually covered a lot of ground in 30 minutes! You can listen to the podcast here.   _____________________________________________________________________ The Bamboo Project is on Facebook! Follow our Page for links, updates and occasional cat photos. 

  Do your frenemies have something to teach you?  In some email conversations with folks lately the idea of frenemies has been coming up. You know who I mean--those people you work with whom you're friendly, but with whom you share a rivalry or who drive you nuts.  We've all had them in our careers. Sometimes they help drive us to greater accomplishments. The friendly competition keeps both of you on your toes. I tend to see this dynamic more often with men, but also with women who have been involved in sports as they grew up. I think there's something about what happens on the playing field that supports that kind of friendly rivalry. You spur each other on to greatness.  But I also see the frenemy dynamic in the people who make us crazy. In those circumstances, we often feel more of the "enemy" part of frenemy. These people annoy or frustrate us and we and are only friendly to the extent that we have to be in order for things to go smoothly at work. But really, the people who are making us crazy could help us learn a lot about ourselves and what we aren't owning in our personalities. And what we aren't owning can be both good and bad.  I had a business partner for a few years who I'd first met through my last job. He really drove me crazy. Very self-promotional (to my mind), very "pushy." Later, after we'd both quit to work on our own, he contacted me to help with a project he was pursuing. I resisted, remembering all my negative feelings about him, but he was persistent and I agreed to meet with him. We ended up partnering on several projects and I started to see where his "pushiness" was something I needed to own in myself if I was going to be a successful business person. Watching him, I learned a lot of things about what I did/didn't want to do.  What changed the dynamic was me being willing to take a friendlier approach to him--to embrace the "friend" part of being frenemies so I could learn from what was making me crazy. As it turned out, he learned some things too, especially about developing empathy and knowing when the "soft sell" would be more effective than the hard sell. It was embracing that frenemy relationship that helped us both grow.  Today, look around and ask yourself about your frenemies, especially those who drive you crazy. What would happen if you approached them as a friend? How could you learn from them? What could they learn from you? How can your frenemies help you build your resilience? And if you have a story about frenemies at work, feel free to share in comments. I'd love to hear about it! ________________________________________________________________   Learning from your frenemies can be a great career resilience experiment. If you want to learn more about experiments and developing resilience, join me for the Career Resilience Virtual Retreat on October 19. More info here. 

  Over the weekend, I had an email conversation with a friend about this post on fear of change at the fork in the road. My friend is supporting a change process where the focus has largely been on the nuts and bolts of the change--training, materials to support new products and services, etc. What's been missing from the process is the real acceptance of the EMOTIONS that come with change--specifically feelings of fear and loss. There hasn't been a venue for acknowledging and dealing with those feelings and they are forming an invisible barrier of resistance to all of the change efforts.  I told my friend that I've begun to believe that we need more ceremony and ritual in our work life if we're going to cope with so much of what comes our way. In our rush to be "productive," make profits or "do good" in the world, we lose sight of the fact that we're talking about people here. And when you're talking about people, then you are inevitably talking about emotions. It's one of the hallmarks of our humanity, yet when it comes to work, we're supposed to check our feelings at the door.  As a species, we've developed rituals and ceremonies to mark major transitions in our lives--the passage from one state to the next. We have rituals for expressing gratitude, for building community and for connecting to spirit. We have ceremonies to celebrate and ceremonies to mourn. Across cultures and throughout history, these ceremonies have been deep, rich and meaningful, meant to provide catharsis and opportunities for closeness to one another as human beings.  But when it comes to our work lives, our rituals and ceremonies are weak shadows of what they could be. Teambuilding exercises and "onboarding" are not what I have in mind here. I'm talking about ceremonies that grab us in our guts and invite us to really feel that we are alive.  It seems to me that part of what keeps us brittle at work, less able to deal with the stresses and emotional ups and downs of our experience is in part a failure of ceremony.  My friend told me that he'd once heard Leo Buscaglia talking about a time when his father had been laid off. Buscaglia's mother cooked up a big Italian dinner and invited the family to celebrate and support the father--a sort of wake for the lost job.  I don't expect any company to be offering this sort of support soon, but isn't this something that we as co-workers could do for someone on our own?  I recognize that many of us can turn to people in our personal lives for this kind of support, but there's still something in me that believes we'd all be better off if the places where we spend at least a 1/3 of our time were also more thoughtful about the power of real ceremony and ritual. It's why I'm a big believer in things like circle practice and art of hosting techniques, which build on our human ways of celebrating, connecting and talking about what's most important. These are the kind of person-centered practices that acknowledge our humanity first, before getting down to business.    Where do you see and feel a need for more ceremony and ritual at work? How can we bring more of our humanity into the work that we do? 

  This morning my LinkedIn feed served up this "gem" on Why Productive People Work on Sundays. I clicked through to see what sage advice was being offered (a long list of things I could be doing with my Sunday to get a "jumpstart" on my week) and then scrolled down to the comments. I was pleasantly surprised to see that most people disagreed with the author, arguing that Sundays at least should be reserved for family, friends, hobbies, outdoor activities and the rest and rejuvenation we all need if we're truly going to be productive.  This feels like progress to me. I've talked to so many people who seem to think that the 24/7 work mode is somehow a measure of their personal morality. Relaxing and taking time for yourself are seen as signs of weakness (at best) or some essential character flaw--Sloth, one of the 7 deadly sins, perhaps.  I think that in part it's been a sign of the recessionary times, where people have been afraid that their jobs will be on the line if they don't give 200% of themselves. And certainly the fact that companies are "doing more with less," (despite record profits) has been driving people to feel like they must work every day.  I'm happy to see, though, that some of us are beginning to fight back against this insanity. We're standing up for our Sundays--and our Saturdays too. Let's keep it up. Working on Sundays is one thing we should NOT be doing! Sundays are for brunch and snuggling in bed for a few more hours, not for managing your inbox or catching up on your networking.    _____________________________________________________________________ Joing me on September 21 for the first Career Clarity Virtual Retreat.  Click here for more information and the link to register! 

  Usually when I wake up, I make a pot of coffee and then make my bleary-eyed way to my computer to begin my work day. I get my best work done in the morning, so I try to capture as many of those minutes as I can.  For the past week, though, my husband and I have been trying something different. After the coffee is made, rather than beginning the work day, we take a few minutes to crawl back into bed and spend some time talking to each other. Nothing major--mostly things like how we slept, what lies ahead for us in the day. But those few minutes of intentional connection before the day starts have become really important to us. They ground us in the reality of our life together, which then gives us energy and motivation for our work and everything else the day holds.  We've been calling this the "soft startup" and it's something I'm beginning to think would benefit most people if they added it to their day. There's something about connecting with the people you love most first thing in the morning that can give you a quiet grounding in what's truly important. It's a reminder that you love and are loved before you head out into a world that's not always kind.  For me, the soft startup has calmed the sense of anxiety and tension that can build during the day. I've noticed that I'm less reactive to annoying situations and frustrating people and that I'm better able to return to my personal center if things do start to rachet up. No doubt it has also improved my relationship with my husband--we find that we are more connected to one another and able to respond to the usual daily stuff with more patience and kindness.  I know that this kind of thing may seem "out of place" on a career blog, but the reality is, we are people first and workers second. Everything we do that benefits us personally, that builds up our resilience muscles and our self-awareness, also impacts our careers. More and more I see this connection and this need to recognize our humanity first.  So your homework for next week is to experiment with the soft startup. Find a way to spend 10-15 minutes each morning intentionally connecting with those who you love. It could be snuggling in bed with your significant other, calling your mother, petting your cat or sitting quietly on the sofa with your child. Anything you can do to ground yourself in the love you have in your life will benefit you for the rest of the day. I promise.   _____________________________________________________________________ During the Career Clarity Retreat on September 21, we'll be talking about other ways you can build support and nurturing into your life. Getting clear about work also means getting clear about all that you need in your life!  Click here for more information and the link to register! 

  I'm currently re-reading a book I bought a few years ago, Soulcraft: Crossing into the Boundaries of Nature and Psyche by Bill Plotkin. It's a beautiful piece of work that I highly recommend for those who want to go very deeply into their life's purpose and personal development.  One of the concepts Plotkin discusses is the idea of our "survival dance" vs. our "sacred dance." This comes from Harley Swift Deer, a Native American teacher.  The Survival Dance Our "survival dance" is what we do for a living, our way of supporting ourselves economically and physically. We must first develop our survival dance as part of our drive to self-reliance. The survival dance can be a paid job. But it could also be creating a home and caring for children or living in a monastary where our spiritual and physical labors contribute to community.  The survival dance is the first dance you must do upon leaving home and you must establish one before you can turn to your sacred dance. It is the survival dance that teaches you the social, psychological and spiritual skills that prepare you to seek out your sacred dance.  The Sacred Dance Our sacred dance is something else altogether. Say's Plotkin: Once you have your surivival dance established, you can wander inwardly and outwardly, searching for clues to your sacred dance, the work you were born to do. This work may have no relation to your job. Your sacred dance sparks your greatest fulfillment and extends your truest service to others. You know you've found it when there's little else you'd rather be doing. Getting paid for it is superfluous. You would gladly pay others, if necessary, for the opportunity.  Another way to think of your sacred dance is as dharma--the intersection of your unique gifts with what the world needs from you in this moment.  In my experience, when we look around and see people who are perfectly content in their own skin, people who seem to have an endless well of passion for their work, even when it's hard or frustrating--these are the people who have found their sacred dance. We are not jealous of their success, as much as we long for what they've found.  Back to Soulcraft: Swift Deer says that once you discover your sacred dance and learn effective ways of embodying it, the world will support you in doing just that. What your soul wants is what the world also wants (and needs). Your human community will say yes to your soul work and will, in effect, pay you to do it. Gradually your sacred dance becomes what you do and your former suvival dance is no longer needed.  I've found this to be true, too. So many people I know have found their sacred dance and have found that the more they embrace it, the more they work to make that sacred dance a reality in their lives, the more the world rises up to support their path.  This isn't to say that there isn't hard work and frustration along the way. There absolutely is. But when you are dancing your sacred dance, you feel in your bones that the hard work is for some essential good in the world that you must express.  There's a difference between working hard at your sacred dance and working hard just for survival.  I believe that too many of us put too much effort into holding on to our survival dance. We become deluded into thinking that we are here merely to survive. We look for ways to make the survival dance BE our sacred dance, but that usually won't be the case. Survival is not the same as living your purpose. So. . . have you found your sacred dance? What can you do to start looking?  Take a step on the journey toward your sacred dance during our virtual retreat on September 21. You'll have a chance to explore some key questions about yourself that could begin to point you in the right direction.   Click here for more information and the link to register! 

  A few months ago, I met a young woman at a networking group with whom I immediately "vibed." She has a ton of energy, great ideas and insight and I really enjoyed talking with her. She's in the process of starting her own business and so picked my brain about how I do things at The Bamboo Project. At the same time, I shared with her that I'm also an artist and showed her some of my artist business cards. She immediately fell in love with my work and started talking with me about all these ideas she had for how I could promote the art.  Since then, we've been meeting regularly, collaborating on some projects, but also providing each other with advice, ideas and a sounding board for our work. Yesterday she came over to my house to talk through a presentation for an entrepreneurial competition she's entered and spent most of the day at my dining room table, working on her plan.  I've been reflecting on the value of this relationship and thinking about how this kind of mentoring is benefiting both of us. At 28, she looks up to me as someone who is more "established" as a business person and picks my brain for how to handle things like setting up contracts and developing client relationships. I recommend books for her to read (she told me that she feels like she's back in college with my "syllabus") and suggest resources for her to check out.  In this process, I am able to step back a little and see myself in a different light. I see my strengths and what has made me successful and that's been a powerful reminder about what I want to do more of in my work. Talking through what I do and how I do it has also helped me see where some parts of my work life are growing too small for me and how I am wanting to move in some different directions. Our conversations clarify for me what needs to shift.  What has also been powerful is her mentoring of me. She brings a different perspective and a "beginner's mind" to things that is helpful. She asks good questions and shares insights that make me think. And her enthusiasm and energy are infectious, so if I start to lose steam or second-guess myself on something, she's able to re-energize me and keep me moving.  Understand, we've fallen into this mutual mentoring relationship somewhat accidentally. There was no formal pairing of us as mentor/mentee. Instead, we followed the energy, realizing that our interactions with each other were inspiring and supportive and that we both wanted that to continue.  I also feel that what makes it more powerful is that it's mutual. I'm not just acting from a place of being this older, more experienced person dispensing my wisdom to a younger colleague. I'm benefiting from the relationship too, possibly more than she is. Mentoring, I believe, has to be a two-way street to really get you anywhere.  So today, I'm celebrating the power of the mentoring relationship, recognizing how it is enriching my work life.  What about you? How are you mentoring someone? How is someone mentoring you? What makes that mentoring relationship rich and meaningful?    Developing a circle of support--including mentors--is just one of the things you'll explore in the Career Clarity Virtual Retreat on September 21.   Click here for more information and the link to register!   

  My friend and colleague Nancy Seibel over at Keys to Change is looking at our busy lives and gathering some information on how we cope with our busy-ness. I wrote about Nancy's questions to help you diagnose what your busy-ness is telling you a few weeks ago and now she's posted a survey to learn more about how busy we are. Definitely stop by to fill it out and learn more about Nancy's work.  I'm finding that for myself, I'm trying to be more mindful of being busy. When is it what I consider to be "good busy," where I'm involved in projects and activities that feel meaningful and create forward momentum and when am I in anxious, stressed mode? If I've moved into stress and anxiety, that's usually a clue that I need to either take a break or that I need to to step back and start saying "no" to some things.  I find that working with my busy-ness is an ongoing challenge, something that always seems to creep up on me. I suppose it's the nature of our lives these days, which means it's even more important for us to get a handle on it.  How do you deal with your busy-ness? 

  In work, as in life, there's a fine line between creating and allowing.  I've seen a lot of people (myself included) put a lot of effort into pushing for things to happen. We look around to see what actions we should take, what more should we DO to move toward what we want.  But there are times in work, as in life, when we have to sit back and allow things to be as they are. Maybe we've done all that we can for right now to create change or forward momentum and now there's a need to just let things be, to let them percoalte a little. You've planted the seeds. Give them some time to grow without digging them up all the time.  I find that this is particularly true when I'm going through a maelstrom of difficult times. I will flail about frantically, trying to do ANYTHING to get me out of what feels so painful. Action--any action--seems preferable to being stuck where I am at that moment.  But often (not always) that's when it becomes apparent that this is when I most need to let go, to surrender to how things are right now and just let the lessons come through to me. Sometimes you have to leave the space for the change to happen.  The thing is, what we planned to have happen isn't always the best thing. Maybe there's something even better that we didn't realize could happen and it's only later, in retrospect, that we can look back and say "Oh, that's why I wasn't making progress the way I thought I should be."  I know. The waiting is hard. The "allowing" sucks. It feels like somehow you're just giving up. But you aren't. You're resting, you're leaving space for change to happen. You're allowing the seeds to take root and grow. That's part of the process too.