How to Make the Job You Have the Job You Love

June 10, 2019 By Josh Altman

The sad, paycheck-to-paycheck mentality that’s been encouraged in our consumer-oriented society isn’t any way to thrive. It’s actually keeping you like a piece in a game someone else is playing.

They want you to believe your place isn’t in innovative, creative production; it’s making money to buy things from companies in control.

But you’re not one to stay down.

Loving your career is possible in a lot of different environments and professions; you just have to find the one that works for you.

Keep an Eye Open for Compatibility

The best way to fall in love with your job is to find the one that syncs up with your natural skills and gut instincts, then use the satisfaction you get from those activities to fuel your growth in other parts of the job.

And it doesn’t take being on TV or selling gorgeous Southern California real estate to have that spark with your job. You just need something about it that really gets you going.

Maybe it’s getting outdoors every day; maybe it’s getting to talk to people; maybe it’s working with kids who really need your help. If you find something interesting and rewarding about your job, getting up every day and doing it to the best of your ability is going to be a lot easier.

Let your Job Challenge You

But watch out— Easy Street can soon become Boring Boulevard. So you also need a job that challenges you, that gives you the fulfilling sense that you’re doing something interesting and worthwhile. Again, any job can be that job. It just has to be the one you see that way.

When I was working in the mail room at a music agency, I had a hard time seeing how my delivering envelopes extra-specially well was doing anything to make rock stars more successful, but some of the guys there did, and that’s what gave them the energy to work consistently, with quality, and with a high level of personal satisfaction.

Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi says the best moments in our lives are not the “passive, receptive, relaxing times. The best moments usually occur if a person’s mind or body is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.” What he’s saying is that you’re not at your best on the beach sipping a margarita; you’re at your happiest when you’re challenging yourself to achieve something you might not be able to do (like pronounce “Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi”).

Flip the Script

Every job gets annoying. It’s a universal truth. Even the best thing in the world, if you get enough of it, will probably stop seeming like the best thing in the world at some point in time. How do you keep the magic alive?

Look for ways to love the annoying, tedious tasks. In real estate, agents will tell you the most annoying part of their job is open houses. Of course, you can see it as a whole day wasted just standing around a house, waiting for people to show up. OR, you can see it as the only time house-hunters will come to you and ask “Hey, can you help me?”

If we’re talking about falling in love with a job like you fall in love with a person, then that has to be the final element: appreciating the quirks.

Some things are deal-breakers—and I get that— but you have to either be invested in the career you have or find something else.

If you can’t find the perfect job, work to make the job you have more perfect. It’s what all the people who have inspired you so far had to do— and it’s what will change the game with your occupational success.