From artists to airline pilots, interns to entrepreneurs, and swim coaches to deep sea fisherwomen, meet ordinary people who have all done something extraordinary – they found meaning and happiness in their work. Discover how and be inspired to find your own work happiness.
How well does your job fit you? We give high importance in meaningful work research to the concept of authenticity. There are literally thousands of self-development books dedicated to being authentic, and the inspirational quotes are all over social media encouraging us to be our true selves at work. It normally goes like this: 1.
How would you describe your relationship with work? Do you feel like one of those couples in new infatuations where it’s all love heart emojis, public displays of affection, and big sloppy kisses? Or do you feel like you’re simply going through the motions to pay the bills? Many of us have been told subtly
Why do you work? That’s a question I often use to open my workshop and keynotes. It’s a question we so rarely stop to deeply think about. Over the years I’ve heard nearly all of the answers but here are the most common. Money! To have a reason to get out of the house! To
I don’t know about you but I REALLY struggle with repetitive tasks. I quit the gym mid-workout (3 sets of 12 reps of bicep curls or something equally boring – no muscles are worth it!), I quit piano lessons when I was kid (scales for a WHOLE hour on a sunny day), and spectacularly quit
Name: Nick From: Ukraine Living: Vienna for 1 year Role in the opera: Extra. Current Opera Character: Soldier in Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro” Why do people go to the Opera? Some go simply for the music, others love the acting, many love the costumes and the sense of drama. For every opera lover there
Bratwurst, urbanism, sunrise… What are your three words for this week? Recently I watched the 90s movie “Before Sunrise” for the first time. Wow! It’s AWESOME! It’s about two people who meet on a train and spend a day wandering around Vienna. It’s romantic. It’s beautiful. I absolutely loved it. (Spoiler alert) in the movie
A funny story of laughs with your coworkers? A sense of satisfaction for achieving something? Perhaps even joy from working on something you love? When I was working towards a burnout, I was regularly bringing home stress, anxiety, worry, snappiness, disconnection, and problems that kept me awake at night. As I slid fully into burnout,
As a recovering perfectionist it’s not easy to admit that. Just writing those words causes a physical reaction. This was one significant factor that led to burnout. Working as an extra in the Vienna State Opera has given me the opportunity to challenge this and other work traits. It’s turned into “the fun jobs project”.
Even the most fun jobs can be stressful. Sure, my job as an Extra is not as stressful as Management Consulting, Brain Surgery, or being a front line Emergency Doctor, but there is pressure to get productions “perfect” before premiere, and there is pressure to perform. I’ve noticed that it affects people in different ways.
I started my “fun job project” to explore how to make work awesome. Working in the opera has been so much fun but it’s also taught me so much that I didn’t expect. On Saturday morning, I turned up for a stage rehearsal, waited around for an hour (this seems to be 80% of the
