Life Planning Part 2

“Look, if you can indulge in your passion, life will be far more interesting than if you're just working. You'll work harder at it, and you'll know more about it. But first you must go out and educate yourself on whatever it is that you've decided to do - know more about kitesurfing than anyone else. That's where the work comes in. But if you're doing things you're passionate about, that will come naturally.”

- Richard Branson           

Gary Buslik was a successful businessman. Having built a profitable security company that paid him $500, 000 a year; most people would just ride the wave into shore and retirement. Still, Gary had a nagging dream.

As an undergraduate Buslik had studied literature graduating with a degree in English. His parents told him he would never be able to make a living with that degree so he went into business. But, Gary “wasn’t happy.”  After many years as an entrepreneur Gary sold his business and entered a PhD program in English at The University of Illinois at Chicago. Today, living modestly off the proceeds of the sale of his company and small teaching salary, Buslik spends his days as a college lecturer and writer and says “I have never regretted my decision” (Money Magazine, May 2010, p.44).

In essence, Gary Buslik had rediscovered his life calling. A calling that had been delayed because of the seduction of false materialistic happiness. He had found what he loved to do, not what would make him rich. This is one of the hardest things to accept about finding your calling: that it might not make you wealthy. In many cases doing what we love does result in material rewards, but only as a by-product of following our dreams.

I hope like, Gary, you have at least begun to uncover your own personal mission. Sometimes this is a difficult process. As I have mentioned before, the activities that produce flow are indicative of our callings. The joy and gratification of well-suited work help us to know that we are on the right track of finding or living in accordance with our inner passions. These passions that reveal our life’s work are often rooted in our strengths.

Our strengths help us to know what we would excel at and very often are the same things that we love to do in the first place. This seems obvious but we do not always live by what is obvious. Before I explain how we might find our personal strengths it is important to understand the difference between strengths and talents.

It is common to use the two terms, talents or strengths, interchangeably, but there is a subtle difference. According to Martin Seligman (2002) talents are those special abilities that we are born with, and that cannot be improved much. Talents are such things as beauty or perfect pitch. Talents are not a result of effort, but of genetic happenstance. This of course does not make talents any less real or powerful, natural talent in speaking for instance can be a valuable asset (p. 134-6). Still, talents are to a great degree limited to improvement.

Further, talents are not moralistic in nature. Having good pitch or a great singing voice is neither good or bad, it just is. While talents can be used for good or ill, they do not intrinsically posses any moral value. Hence we hear stories of wasted talent with disgust, not because the talent was good or bad in and of its self, but that the individual wasted the application of it. In other words, it is only the application of talent that becomes morally loaded (Ben-Shahar, 2007)

Strengths on the other hand are character traits. These traits such as “love of learning” are learned and enhance able. The idea is that all of us have predispositions to possessing various strengths, but that the realization of these strengths depends on our decision to: 1. Recognize our strengths and 2. Develop them (Seligman, 2002, p. 136-7).

The first part of the task, recognizing our strengths is very important to making sure that our perceived calling and mission are outcrops of them. We must make certain that or zeal for a certain calling is not derailed by our lack of strengths paramount to successfully following it. Thus, as we craft our mission statement we also have to examine them in context of our strengths first, and later our talents.

For example, it does us no good to uncover a perceived calling of being an NBA basketball player if we do not have the strength of self-control through temperance, nor the talent of exceptional athletic ability. While the crux of our life callings lie in the exercise of both our strengths and talents, it is more useful to focus on the strengths because they are malleable.

  Thanks to Martin Seligman we have a simple tool that we can use to help us discover our strengths, as they are not as apparent as or talents. Seligman has developed a psychological survey that helps people discover what areas they should spend time developing. This survey is located at: http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/Default.aspx

You do have to create a user name and password and your info will be compiled for research, but this is the best tool for assessing your strengths out there and it is free. Under the “Engagement Questionnaire” section take the “VIA Survey of Character Strengths.”

            After taking the survey it will show you your top strengths with a brief explanation of each. Read through your strengths carefully and ask yourself if these strengths are inline with the mission and calling that you have been carving out. For example, my number one strength is “love of learning.” This strength is concordant with my mission to “Be a teacher and a learner.” As you read through your strengths adjust your mission statement accordingly and maybe ask a friend to review it to see if you are being true to yourself.

References

Ben-shahar, Tal (2007). Happier: learn the secrets to daily joy and lasting fulfillment. NY, McGraw-Hill.

Money Magazine. May 2010

Seligman, Martin E.P. (2002). Authentic happiness: using the new positive psychology to realize your potential for lasting fulfillment. NY, Free Press.