Are You Managing Your Life? Or Micromanaging It?

Careers are funny things. We spend the early parts of our lives learning through experience and discovery. In our teens, we imagine our adult lives, dream about possibilities, and revel in the wonders of figuring it all out.

Then, as adults, we crush those dreams trying to fit them neatly into a so-called “career”, tug and pull them to stay on some defined path, fret about choices we make until we are sick at our stomachs, and then spend all our energies on efforts to be “successful.” If we aren’t sure, we look for external validation–other people’s opinions, higher paychecks, and opportunities working for the top employers in our fields.

And we wonder why, so often, upon taking hard looks at our lives and careers, we see a jumbled, crumpled mess that we can hardly recognize.

Isn’t it obvious? You can’t force something as huge as your life purpose into a small container and expect it to fit. Forcing it in will only fray the edges. And sooner or later, the whole thing will break in front of you, or simply fall apart.

Buddhists look at life and they see it full of suffering. The human condition, as most people experience it, is like a “wheel out of kilter.” The unexamined life, lived in the pursuit of external validation, will occasionally give you a bumpy ride. And anyone who’s ever been four-wheeling in the mud can tell you it’s fun stuff-until you get thrown off and break your neck when your ATV rolls right over you.

The answer to suffering, then, is to quit wanting the wrong things, and to quit stuffing your life purpose into a box, forcing into a corner, or putting it where other people tell you to put it.

Well, you might ask, “Since there is no perfect job, I might as well find one that will pay me well and leave it at that, right?”

That’s not a good way to look at the situation. You see, your job may be easy to understand and your tasks easy to accomplish, but sooner or later, if it’s not a natural fit, and you lack passion (or lose passion) for it, you will find yourself feeling empty and you will suffer.

In careers, the best promotions and opportunities are not always given to the most qualified content expert, or the person who has shown mastery for a skill. They are just as likely (perhaps more likely) to be given to those who show an interest in the topic, a passion for getting it done, and an appreciation for the process that gets them to the solution.

So you can’t really fake it forever. And you really shouldn’t try.

We hear a lot in the workplace about supervisors who look over their employee’s shoulders, give overly specific instructions for how to do things, deadlines that may not be realistic, and criticism that is neither warranted nor helpful. We call these people “micromanagers,” and the general consensus in the workplace is clear: workers hate to be micromanaged.

Why would your life be any different?

Imagine that you are not merely a planner for your life, but its manager. The employee (your life) looks for guidance, not control. Circumstances outside your realm of experience come up, and your life comes to you with questions, with opportunities, and with new, creative ways of thinking. But since they don’t fit some plan you have, you yell at your life, tell it you know what you want, and send it away crying. After that, your life shuts down and decides not to bring you questions, or help you examine opportunities. And it sure as hell won’t bring you creative ideas, because we all know how that’s going to work out.

In the end, your life is a miserable employee, and you wind up bitter because your plan doesn’t fit the circumstances in front of you. It eats at you until you do one of three things: give up, blow up, or walk away.

Wouldn’t you be a better manager for your life if you gave up pushing for circumstances to be how you want them to be, and started accepting them for what they are, and listening to what your life is telling you?

Of course you would. This is the essence of purposeful living. Accepting how things are, and approaching them with enthusiasm, creativity and an open mind will lead you to discoveries and accomplishments you hadn’t yet imagined.

So maybe it’s time to ask yourself some hard questions. Are you managing your life and career? Or micromanaging them?

Sean Cook is a Certified Life Purpose and Career Coach, specializing in work with Higher Ed Professionals. In addition to serving as lead writer/editor/publisher for this site and companion site HigherEdLifeCoach.Com, he provides individual and group coaching, and offers presentations to campus and community groups.

Today, from 12 pm to 1 pm EST, he is again hosting the Higher Ed Life and Careers Show on BlogTalkRadio.  Today’s topics: Accidents, Purpose, Job Searching and Twitter. Guests include regular co-host Bryan Koval and Monica Moody, a Life Purpose Coach who also serves as Director of Career Development at Wesleyan College in Macon, GA, and writes a blog on discovering your life purpose at IgnitePurposeNow.Com. Monica and Sean will be introducing a new segment on putting Passion, Purpose and Presence into your life and career. Please listen in (go to show link above) and call in your questions and comments to (347) 989-0055 or send them via twitter to @hiedcareercoach