How to get unstuck at work and move forward

– The number one crucial step is to get where you want to be

Linda is my best friend.

After she graduated from a university in pharmaceutical with a Master degree, she landed a nice job with the largest State owned pharmaceutical company in China. After eight years, she became the youngest senior engineer in the company and was assigned with an international project to work in Tokyo in a Nobel Prize Winner’s laboratory.

Linda completed her project in two years in Japan, published her research results on a peer-reviewed international journal…

She applied grant after returning from Tokyo. She was pumped with energy and excitement with her new learning and research capability after coming back to her company. She wanted to contribute more…

However, her grant application got denied.

Linda was back to where she was two years ago.

How do you feel if you were Linda? Disappointed? May be.

But, life moves on.

Would you stay where you are if you were Linda?

The reality was that being in a state owned pharmaceutical company is like that you already have your golden bow for the rest of your life, with the nice salary and benefits. And Linda’s family and friends were around as well…

Linda was frustrated, not satisfied with her situation at work…

Time passed by… one week… one month… three months…

Linda was not happy, and she noticed that she developed shoulder pain, and neck pain… The pains became so sever that she had to see her doctor…

She had medication, acupuncture and message treatments…

Six months passed by her pains were still lingering around…

She went to an international conference to present her research in Japan. A professor from Canada was very interested in her research and came to her asking questions. The discussion went for a while… and Linda was encouraged to apply for a Ph.D study in his lab.

So she did,

Linda followed her heart – the internal craving for growth, bravely with clear determination. And her pains mysteriously disappeared soon after.

Person growth is the number drive for our happiness. If you are not satisfied with your situation, look internally and pay attention what makes you tick.

Very often, what makes us tick, makes us burst to sing, usually reflects our personal value, and what is meaningful for us.

So become more aware of those signals. Become more clear with what you want and why you want it.

Once you are clear what you want, you are half way to your success.

Go deep to find what you want today. Clarity is the key.

Sing a song

You sing songs.

Songs have high, low, plat notes, and pauses. The combinations of these elements make a song so beautiful, so touching, so memorable…

our life just like a song.

Success, failure, struggles in between, happiness, sadness, boring… all of these are notes in your music.

Even when we feel our life is on hold, it is just like a pause in a song.

They all will come and pass.

And the combination of all of the moments in your life creates the songs in your life. It is your choice how to make each song in your life. It is your decision how to sing each song.

Why I feel like an imposter?

I feel that I am plagued by feeling like an imposter very often.

I feel that I am out of place, I am not good enough, I did not do enough…

I feel so bad about myself that when people tell me that how wonderful, how incredible, how good I am, I do not believe any of these. I thought they are trying to make happier.

Then, I hear again, again, and agin compliments from others.

“May be I am good for what they tell me?” One day I talk to myself. “May be I am truly not that inadequate after all?”

Then more, I caught my self talks – “the out of place”, “not good enough”, and “did not do enough” are all what I feel from others. Where is ME in this self criticizing dialogues?

Obviously I was living for others, not for myself during those moments.

When I started to live for myself, I felt the serenity and the imposter was hiding some where.

Start to live for my true self is the way for me to put my imposter in check.

That is it.

When you open your hands…

When I opened my hand to a stranger first time, I felt uncertain – will she open her hand to me as well? What if she refuses my handshake? What would other people think of me?

I felt vulnerable.

However, people also open their hands to me when I open mine.

It’s a brave action to open your hand first.

You are brave to bring yourself up to the front first.

Exposing your vulnerability is a brave action.

We grow from our vulnerability, becoming stronger and more connected.

Be a good listener

To connect with people or to have influence to others need you to be a good listener.

Being a good listener means you have your full attention on the person speaking to you. You have curiosity to ask her questions to find more about her and her doing.

When you become a good listener, you understand people better. Being understood is one of our native needs – that is to get accepted and to get recognized and to be seen.

What do you feel if you are accepted, recognized and been seen?

I would open my heart to the people understood me. I will feel happy to see the person. I will feel closer to the person. And naturally, what ever the person says will make a good impression on me. She will impact me somewhat.

That’s how influence works.

Being a good listener is to be an influencer.

Make a difference

Many of us want to make our own marks, put our labels, express our values to make a difference.

Actually, the thought to make a difference in the world already inspires many of us.

What does it exactly mean to you when you want to make a difference? What kinds of difference do you want to make?

You can not make a difference unless you recognize how different you are.

Take a moment to identify how different you are. What energizes you. What makes you feel free. What makes you felt growing and fulfilled and happy. What footprint you’d like to leave to the world.

Then you may be on your way to make a difference.

Start, whether you are ready or not…

Start to do something new is a scary thing, especially when you feel you are not ready yet.

You may feel that you are not ready, because you haven’t done all your research, or you haven’t practice enough, or you haven’t gotten all the advice, or… therefore, you postpone and wait for your readiness.

Waiting until you’re ready is an excuse.

You are hiding.

You choose to stay in your comfort zone to avoid daring into the unknown. And because the unknown could bring failure, mistakes, you are afraid.

However, when you start your initiative whether you are ready or not, you may find a new world, grow new muscles, make new friends.

Our society progresses by millions of millions of people venturing into unknown to bring innovation, create new roads.

Whether you are ready or not, take a leap forward. If you fall, you still fall forward.

Emotions are for actions…

When you are emotional, what would do?

Say, when you have various emotional situations: happy, excited, sad, angry, jealous, sympathetic, empathetic, fear… What would you do about them?

When Experiencing an Emotion it is a good signal for you to take action.

Emotions are telling you something about yourself. This is the best time to exam yourself and check what is going on inside and do something about it.

Usually emotions are reflecting either what’s going on is resonating with you or discords with your values and believes.

So, when you are emotional, it is the time to reflect again who are you, what you want?

Emotions are for you to take actions.

Work with purpose

We all want to have the drive for a good work.

However,

Some days we are not clear what we do will deliver our expected results or not. Some days we are frustrated by many meticulous things in life and at work. Some days we are distracted… or tired…

we are human.

To have a good day of work is to know your purpose every day. Every time you feel not clear about what you do. You will need to take a break and dig deep to think your purpose of work.

Because every moment is unique. Once it passes, it’s gone forever. To make our work enjoyable, we need have a purposeful doing. This will make us feel meaningful, energize us and have a good day.

You could have a few times a day, say five moments, to pause, reflect, meditate, looking for bigger picture, appreciate… realign your work with your purpose.

Each moment could last a few minutes, or even some seconds. It can make a big difference to your quality of work.

Work with purpose.

Love yourself first and foremost

I was educated to serve others first from very young by the environment I grew up. If I served myself first, I was criticized as selfish. Therefore, I had been tried hard to think for others, serve others first.

Until…I began my second job, I realized that I was not happy always put others first. When I was not myself, I could not treat others fairly, I could not make others happy even though I tried really hard.

I learned then that only when I am myself, I can treat others better. When I feel happy, I am happily doing my work, talking to others and living happily.

Me comes first is not a selfish act. It is actually a responsible act. It is first and foremost important rule in life.

Michelle Obama said the lesson she learned first year at White House is to love herself first. Only then she can love the President Obama, her daughters, her job and what she does…

Oprah said the similar thing, love yourself first before you could love anyone else truly.

Love yourself first and foremost, then you can love the world more, give more, and create more.