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068 - Start Loving the Job You Hate

Hello there. Kevin here with another episode of The Feel Good English podcast.

The only English podcast in the entire universe that is helping you not only become more fluent in English, but also more fluent in life, business and relationships as well.

So around ten years ago I was at the airport waiting for a flight and I got to talking with somebody in the bar over a beer. I enjoy having a beer before I get on an airplane.

And this guy was a little older than me I would say he was around forty years old; he lived in San Francisco and he was a very outgoing friendly guy very interesting to talk to.

And he instantly went into telling me about what he does and what he was traveling for. He was a writer, he wrote fiction books based on business management techniques. So he tied in business lessons with fiction which was very interesting and he was pretty successful with what he did.

He started asking me about me and what I wanted to do with my life and he give me a quick personality test which was pretty intense.

He started asking me about what I was passionate about and what I really was interested in in life. And I told him music and travel and I asked him how am I going to connect this with work and how am I going to find a career in this? Am I going to be a famous professional DJ and whatnot?

What he told me stuck with me until this day and he said because you’re passionate about something does not mean that is what you should focus on as a career. We need to be able to separate what could be considered as a hobby, like playing music, making music and what should be pursued as a career that’s going to support our lives and to give us satisfaction as well.

Now some people have become successful in music careers or art or film or as an actor, but it is obviously pretty rare.

Or even looking at sports, you love soccer, how many people out of a thousand become a professional soccer player? Less than one?

So, the idea that we need to pursue our passion as a career is a little misguiding. In the book that I’m going to talk about this week is called So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport.

I have done another episode on a book called Deep Work also by Cal Newport he is a really really good author, a young guy, he knows current society how the system works these days and I really enjoy reading his books.

And in this book he is going to go deeper into this idea that we should find work that is valuable to society and do certain things that will make us fall in love with this work; that will bring passion into this work even though it might not be connected with our true passions which might have to be put aside as a hobby and not a career path. A very interesting book, a very useful book.

And before I get into the lesson just to give you a quick reminder, if you want transcripts to the Feel Good English Podcast, . go to feelgoodenglish.com, there you will find some free transcripts for you to get started with and see how reading the transcripts to these lessons can help you internalize the lessons in the new English that is used here at the Feel Good English Podcast. So after episode go to feelgoodenglish.com and the click on the button that says “Free Transcripts” and get free transcripts.

No let’s get into the lesson on the book So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Call Newport.

I just told you that following your passion in life and building a career of your passion might not be the best plan. Is it that discouraging? Is that disappointing? Or does it give you a little insight as to why you might be frustrated with your current career or your current job and make you step back and think a little bit, hey maybe I am trying too hard to follow this whole idea of follow your passion.

Where did this idea of a follow your passion come from anyway?

Well it was actually a movement that started in at the 1970s and it was kind of based on an illusion that there was a magic job out there that is the perfect job for you, it will solve all your problems. Why did we all of a sudden think that a job should be perfect and it should make us happy and a perfect job is exactly what we have always been looking for in life?

Since it is impossible for everybody in the entire world to find the perfect job, doesn’t that sound pretty ridiculous? What can you do instead?

Well, Cal Newport, the author of this great book, So Good They Can’t Ignore You suggests a couple of things and I’m going to get into these now.

The first idea here is you have to become really really good at what you are doing. Uh oh! That is going to require hard work, that is going to require commitment, that is going to require not doing what you love all of the time.

But what he is saying here is you have to become great at what you are doing and through research he has actually found the better you are at your job the more you are going to like it.

Think about it, have you ever started a new job or something totally new for you and you hated it because you were new at it and you weren’t good at it and you thought people were judging you and it was difficult. And before you could even get too good at it you left.

So what should you do instead? Getting really good at a job requires something called the craftsman mindset. So, the craftsman mindset and this is different from asking yourself what do I want? What is the perfect job for me? What am I passionate about? What can this job do for me? How can this job it made me happy? That is not craftsman mindset.

By contrast, the craftsman mindset asks what value can I bring to my job? The craftsman mindset acknowledges that no matter what field you are in success is about what? Success is about quality. When you adopt this mindset you will not hesitate to do what is necessary to improve the quality of your work and by improving the quality of your work and improving your ability to do that work well, you are going to feel better about it..

So it is backwards, it is not finding a job that is perfect for you, becoming happy that you got the job and then being able to relax and enjoy the rest of your life in that kush job. No. You have to deserve that job, you have to earn that position.

Developing a craftsman mindset is just this, getting really really good at it, focusing on the skills and changing your mindset and asking how can you bring value to this job?

Part of this too is do something useful and good for the world. Are you, do you have a mission behind what me you are doing? Are you providing value to people out there and not just doing something that you don’t feel there is a lot of value given.

And if you have ever had a job or you don’t think you’re helping people, you are not bringing value through your business, it is quite discouraging. I agree.

So another point here is what makes a job likeable? It might not be the perfect job based on your passion, but the job that you have, or another job can be likeable based on certain factors.

The first factor, a job that you will like lets you have control over what you do. You need to have control over the work that you do.

This control isn’t given, you have to earn it.

It is a factor when considering a job that you like, however, it has to be earned and it has to be earned through developing rare and value the skills, skills that companies need that a lot of people don’t have.

Makes sense, right?

You have noticed the people that get paid well, that get good jobs usually are very good at things that a lot of other people aren’t good at.

Using the craftsman mindset and getting you the deep and focused on building your skills in a specific area, very very specific area, is how we will find more satisfaction in our job.

So what can we specifically do to get better at what we are working with? You have been at a job, maybe you are a computer programmer maybe you are a marketer, maybe you are an accountant. What can you do to go deep into that skill and to have this craftsman mindset and to become so good at that skill that they can’t ignore you?

I am going to talk about what you can do and also how you can apply this specific tactic to your English learning, right after this quick message from our sponsor.

Because you’re probably English learner, if you’re listening to this and you would like to improve your skills in English and become so good at English that they can’t ignore you; whoever “they” are.

An idea from this book the author talks about is called deliberate practice. Deliberate practice is strategic study, serious study that brings faster results.

So in the case of an English learner they have to find situations that are uncomfortable for them where they are using English around people that are better than them and that make them feel awkward.

Getting very focused on specific vocabulary and expressions so they can become very comfortable with that specific language and just using it and practicing it very deeply focused and strategically until they become great with that specific vocabulary in that one situation.

To give you an example: Let us say you are a student and you’re studying something about computer science, you’re going to get really focused on a paper at that to you are reading or find something on internet and you’re going to go deep into that vocabulary, learn that vocabulary deeply for one week, two weeks and then find a teacher online or in person or just a language partner and you’re going to practice with that language very deliberately until you get really comfortable with that.

When you face the situation in the future talking about this very specific topic you will kill it, you will do very well. And this is something I teach my coaching clients, if you want to see quicker results use this idea of deliberate practice.

Get focused, find uncomfortable situations that push you out of your comfort zone and use that to continue moving forward. It’s the same idea from the book, he uses it in a career aspect so if you are a computer programmer, what skill do you need to develop? Get deep with that, focus on that, make sure it is difficult for you so you can get better and better at that. And then when your boss asks you if you know that skill, you will say yes, you will do a good job with it and then you will all of a sudden find yourself enjoying your job.

So again, action steps think about your current situation. Do you get frustrated a lot with your job? Are you dissatisfied often? Well maybe instead of looking for that perfect job, you should start focusing on developing your own skills and getting great at what you do, so people will come looking for you and that will bring job satisfaction to you, guaranteed.

Applying this to your English, simplify what you are using to improve, get really focused on specific content and then find situations to practice with this content with native speakers either speaking or writing, making sure that you are a little uncomfortable, that it is not that easy for you, build confidence in these specific situations. And the more you do this, the more situations you will build confidence in and eventually you will be Mr Confident, or Mrs Confident. Either one.

If you are really connected with this book and the ideas taught in this book go to feelgoodenglish.com/ignore and you know what?

You can download the audio book for free.

Download it to your phone through an app called Audible which is a great way to listen to audio books and make notes and create bookmarks and go deeply into the content taught in these books. It is awesome, I use it all of the time to listen to audio books while I am in the car or taking a train or riding my horse through the mountains. I don’t do that, just kidding.

But go to feelgoodenglish.com/ignore and download the audio book to So Good They Can’t Ignore You.

And I cannot ignore the joke for the day. A boss is like a diaper they’re always on your ass and they are usually full of crap.

Stay tuned for the quick vocabulary lesson and until next time, instead of complaining about your job, get really really good at it and show your boss who’s boss.

See you in the next episode.

In the beginning of the episode I used the phrase “I got to talking with somebody.” It is kind of strange to get the talking with somebody.

In this case when you say I got to doing something, I got to doing something it means you started doing something. I got to talking with him or I got to finishing my paper, I got to finally recording that podcast episode. So that means just start doing something. . Misguiding something can be misguiding, at two minutes and thirty four seconds I say misguiding. That means misleading, confusing, not taking you in the right direction or not helping you to think correctly. This is very misguided information or this information is misguiding.

Three minutes and around ten seconds, to put aside, put this aside, means to get something out of your way to put it on the side to not focus on something, it could be a distraction. You need to put this aside, you need to put your phone aside, meaning literally put it to the side, get it out of your way so you stop being distracted buy it.

Seven minutes twenty seconds, as very cool word “kush.” A kush job means a very comfortable job. Kush can mean very comfortable.

“That’s a really kush chair that you have.” It’s a really comfortable chair.

“Awkward”, ten minutes and twenty seconds, awkward ; strange, uncomfortable, weird. “Something feels awkward in here.” Something doesn’t feel right, something feels strange to me, makes me feel a little uncomfortable.

Another expression, “You will kill it.” Talked about to that at the end, you will kill it. If you get really good with one area of English and then you are tested on that area, “you will kill it”, meaning you will do really really well on that.

Or, “I played a soccer game last night and I killed it.” I did really well.

At the very end of the episode, “Show them who is boss.” That’s a cool expression, “I am going to show them who is boss, I am going to show them who’s boss” meaning exactly that. Show them who is boss, show them who is the best, show them who is in charge.