Designing Your New Work Life: How to Thrive and Change and Find Happiness--and a New Freedom--at Work

by Bill Burnett

Dysfunctional Belief: It’s not working for me here. Reframe: You can make it work (almost) anywhere.

More than 93 percent of Japanese workers report themselves in the disengaged category. The Japanese even have a variety of special names for these extra miserable jobs: a shachiku worker (社) translates to “corporate livestock” or “corporate slave worker,”

Dysfunctional Belief: I am a cog in the machine. Reframe: I am a lever that can impact the machine. Bonus Reframe: I’m a human, not a machine, and I deserve a creative and interesting job.

The truth is, when we live our lives waiting to get somewhere, the only place we get is stuck.

You can get caught endlessly chasing more peace, more mindfulness, or more magnanimity just as easily as more money. It may be a more noble race—but it’s still a trip to frustration and constant not-there-yet-ness.

Research has made it abundantly clear that one of the secrets to a happy life is to learn how to enjoy what you have.

What makes life meaningful and what maximizes your happiness and longevity are relationships—who you love and who loves you. And there is a strong correlation between doing something for the benefit of others and living a longer, healthier life.

Good enough for now leaves open the possibility of growth and change but doesn’t make changing for change’s sake a goal. And it doesn’t make getting “more” a priority.

“Never confuse the quality of a decision with the quality of the outcome—they are really two different things. The only thing you can control is the quality of your research and the quality of the resulting decision.”

for now implies hope, hope that there might be a better outcome in the future, and it gives us a space to prototype into.

We have a few different categories of “noticing” that are connected to the research about what makes work “good work,” and they are: What did I learn? What did I initiate? Who did I help?

There are two types of life design reflections: 1.Savoring 2.Insight

Reflection will definitely help you avoid missing insights, but you can’t demand an insight after every experience.

7th Day Reflection Exercise Here’s a simple four-step exercise you can do weekly. We recommend making it a regular practice to get the most out of it. 1. Retreat Find a quiet spot where you can sit comfortably for five to ten minutes, either at a table or with a surface you can write on (preferably by hand, but typing is okay if you prefer). Close your eyes and just breathe for a moment. Take at least three or four full, calming breaths to slow yourself down and be glad that you’re alive and have this quiet moment to yourself. 2. Review Now, while still keeping your eyes closed, let the last seven days flow before your mind’s eye. As you do so, look for two to four moments in your week that you are attracted to and grateful for in retrospect. Note: Beware of being “attracted” to problems, conflicts, forgotten to-do items, etc. The mind loves to get caught up in that stuff. When that stuff appears (and it will), just tell yourself, I’ll get to that another time, and let it go. Don’t fight it or attempt to resolve it—both of which will steal all your attention. Just acknowledge it, then let it go and return to your reflection. Yes…this takes some practice to get the hang of. As you review your week, being attentive to those two to four moments, very briefly jot down just one or two words for each such moment that stands out, so you won’t lose it. “Cheerful grocer” or “finished essay” or “appeased boss.” 3. Reflect When you’ve got your list, look it over. Fully savor each of ...

the market economy, we measure the all-mighty dollar; for the making a difference economy, it’s all about impact; and in the creativity economy, we measure expression.

If it is a choice you make, your life can be good enough, even great, with the things you “choose into.”

Dysfunctional Belief: I can’t make a living as an artist, dancer, singer, painter…fill in the blank. Reframe: I know the money-versus-meaning problem is a false dichotomy, and I’m not letting the market define who I am and what I create. I decide how much money, impact, and self-expression works for me.

Learning the art of reframing to find a better problem is by far the most crucial of your life design skills.

rather than solving a problem, we’re actually just responding to a problem and trying to get it into an acceptable new state. When we’ve attained that new and more acceptable situation, we’ve come to a resolution. The problem might not be permanently solved, but it is resolved for now, it is re-solved.

70 percent of the problems that couples wrestle with are unsolvable.

They do not let these problems end up destroying their happiness. They seek a “good enough” resolution of these perpetual problems and move on.

Lack of control. You are not able to influence decisions that affect your job, such as your schedule, assignments, or workload. Unclear job expectations. You’re unclear about the degree of authority you have or what your supervisor expects from you. Dysfunctional workplace dynamics. You work with an office bully, you feel undermined by colleagues, your boss micromanages your work, or there are lots of “office politics” that you don’t understand (see the next chapter to get help with office politics). Mismatch in values. If your values differ from the way your employer does business or handles grievances, the mismatch can eventually take a toll. Poor job fit. Your job doesn’t fit your interests and skills, or you are underemployed and bored all the time. Overwhelmed with tasks. Your job is chaotic and there is too much to do. Lack of social support. You feel isolated at work and in your personal life. Work–life imbalance. Your work takes up so much of your time that you don’t have the energy to spend time with your family and friends.

1. Everything starts with enjoying what you do. To persevere, you need to be intrinsically interested in your subject (more on intrinsic motivation coming up). We’d add the designer’s mind-set of curiosity, a potential precursor to interest, to this asset. 2. Next comes the capacity to practice. You must devote yourself to the kind of deliberate and well-informed practice that leads to mastery. And you must practice, every day, every week, every year—there is no end to practice—it is an end in and of itself. 3. Third is purpose. You have to believe that your work matters to something and someone greater than yourself. 4. And, finally, you have to be a hopeful person. Hope is what keeps you going even when things get tough and your plans aren’t working. Hope is related to optimism and a deeper sense that your mission is ultimately possible.

The drive for autonomy, relatedness, and competence is part of your humanness; these qualities are part of your intrinsic motivation system.

Dysfunctional Belief: I have a bad job, and I need to quit! Reframe: There are no bad jobs, just jobs that fit badly, and I can redesign right where I am to make my own “good” job.

1.Reframe and reenlist to the job you have by finding a different story for and relationship to your work, crafted by realigning your activities around your organization’s priorities—making you more valuable in the process. 2.Remodel your job through a combination of cosmetic and structural modifications that better align with your interests while utilizing more of your signature strengths, resulting in improved performance that makes your boss happier and improved engagement that makes you happier. 3.Relocate. Slide laterally into a new role that’s within reach, even if it’s not obvious at first. Either it’s an existing opening or a new position created just for you. 4.Reinvent. Launch a new career. It’s the You 2.0 Program, but at the same company, in a completely different kind of role for which you’ve prepared and retrained to give you a major career refresh and your employer continued access to a loyal and valuable team member.

before you quit, have that conversation with your boss. Ask one simple question. “What am I doing wrong?”

“I’m leaving because I have an opportunity to take my career to the next level and learn new and exciting things. I love this company, and I’m sad to be leaving my great colleagues here, but it’s time for me to move on to my next challenge.”

Give yourself a long weekend and do something you really like doing to recharge your batteries and get set to start a whole new season of job searching. Get your head wrapped about taking at least three and up to six to nine months for this project. Pace yourself—this is not a sprint. Make a Take It with Me inventory, listing all the assets you’ve gained during your employment in your current work. Don’t forget to list all types of things: learnings, peak experiences, hard challenges, people, relationships, personal growth, accomplishments, future goal clarity, credibility building, etc. Read and search and click your way all around your locale and your area of career interest to find out what’s happening, what companies are leading, and who’s doing what. Reach out to your network for referrals to “get the story” meetings, prototype conversations about relevant topics that are current in your field and of sincere interest to you. And scan LinkedIn for people you’d like to have coffee with, and do not ask them for a job! They will be blown away that you think they are interesting. Then start having those conversations and enjoy yourself! Make the learning its own game and its own reward. Repeat the process until it works and you find a new job worth taking. And throughout the process, keep doing great work in your current job. Finish strong to start strong.

the average self-employed worker makes less money than they would if they had a full-time job.

The only place a straight-line pathway ever existed in the wayfinding journey like the one shown above was in a false image in your head. The eight-step process shown here, including the loop-de-loops and the reversals, is an efficient and effective approach. Each small step eventually gets you closer to where you’re going.

It turns out that fitting out an office, even with really expensive stuff, is only 5 percent of the cost; 95 percent is the cost of the lease.

Christopher Booker, in his book The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories, claimed that there are only seven plots, and these are the backbone of all human stories: 1.Overcoming the Monster (Little Red Riding Hood, Jaws) 2.Rags to Riches (Cinderella, David Copperfield, Rocky) 3.The Quest (The Odyssey, Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings) 4.Voyage and Return (Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Gulliver’s Travels) 5.Comedy (Shakespeare’s comedies, The Hangover 1, 2, and 3) 6.Tragedy (Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet) 7.Rebirth (A Christmas Carol, Groundhog Day)