Do What You Love And You Never Work Again - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Do What You Love And You Never Work Again - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career In the words of Confucius, “Choose a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life.” Does this sound too good to be true? For over a decade I pursued my dream and led a business that was built out of pure passion, in essence I did what I loved. While it’s true that the days meld into one another, and before you know it know it time has passed like sands through an hourglass, Confucius has one on me. In my experience, it still felt like work (particularly in the early years). Keeping your bank accounts full In recent years, the economic conditions have given rise to many individuals reconsidering the W2 lifestyle. Filling your back account comes in many different ways and being mindful of this is essential, particularly if you choose to fill them by pursuing your passion outside the stability of a W2 paycheck. Stability. Finances. Health (and health insurance). Emotional stability. Physical Health. There are many areas we deposit and debit from all day long that add up to “work/life balance.” Will doing what you love deposit or debit from your mental bank account (remember to consider the stress)? How will it affect your physical account? Does it deposit or debit from your relationship bank account? All your accounts need to be balanced in order for an opportunity to be the right one. Choosing your passion The irony in all of this is that the majority of people (including you) possess such talents in life that when it comes to deciding about a career or business, it is less about what you love, and more about what you can do with what you love. What am I talking about? Take me for example. I love shoes (Ok, I adore them) yet without the necessary skills (e.g. designing, manufacturing, distributing) necessary to effectively run a shoe business, my chances of being successful are rather limited even with my passion. The wise choice is to choose a passion where my skills also align so I have the best choice for success. Go for it The first step to anything in life is making the decision to go for it. Are you ready to fill up your bank accounts by pursuing your passion full-time? If you answer YES then GO FOR IT. Choose your passion wisely, align your skill set and make the decision to start doing what you love. As Confucius said “…you will never work a day in your life.” Here’s to never working a day in our lives. Author: Adriana Llames is the Division Vice President, Social Media Marketing for Sears Holdings and the acclaimed author of “Career Sudoku: 9 Ways to Win the Job Search Game”. Llames led a boutique career coaching services firm for over a decade and has been featured on ABC, CNNMoney, CBS News and Yahoo! For more information, visit www.adrianallames.com