|
Choosing Between Work You Love & Money
Investing In The Work You Love
Do you think you have to choose between doing work you love and earning a good living? Or that "putting a price tag" on doing what you love will ruin it?
Below are a few facts about making a living doing what you love that may surprise you and give you a new way to look at the choice between making money and loving what you do. By the end we think you might agree with us that the choice is not about choosing one over the other -- but instead how to use them like a one-two punch to achieve your dreams.
From our observations, we think the following are true ...
Fact #1 - The cost for preparing for a career is the same whether you hate it or love it. Just think about college. Textbooks, school supplies, and classes do not cost more if you love the subject. And no school we know of gives you a discount on tuition if you hate your major. So loving what you do does not change how much you have to spend.
Fact #2 - Starting a business you love requires the same investment as starting a business you hate. The cost of leases, office equipment, employee salaries and the other expenses of running a business are not more if you love the business and less if you hate it. The prices are based on market values, not on how you feel about your new business. The fact is that all businesses require you to "buy" your way in if you want to have the freedom and earning potential of owning your own business.
So if Facts #1 and #2 are true, the initial costs for preparing for your dream job or opening your dream business are the same regardless of whether you love or hate the work. Why is all this important? Because when you look at making a good living, you have to look not only at what you earn but what you had to invest to get that paycheck or profit.
However, if you do not train for your dream career in high school and college, the investment could become so high that you never train for your dream job. Why? Because of fact #3 ...
Fact #3 - Most people find it very hard to invest time and money in re-training later on in life. Although most of us can't wait to graduate from high school, it is an opportunity that only comes once in a lifetime. The same is true for college and basic vocational training. Because it takes 2, 4 or even 8 years to prepare for some professions -- and thousands of dollars -- most students get their training before they have to shoulder the responsibility of supporting themselves and raising a family. Scholarships, grants and loans are geared to helping people at the beginning of their career when the only bills they have are for tuition, books, and room and board. Once you add in supporting a family, making house payments and saving for retirement -- the burden of going back to school stops most adults from retraining unless they are laid off or have no other choice. So few adults go back to school full time to learn the skills they need to start their dream business or train for their dream jobs.
Unfortunately, Fact #3 means that if you trained for the wrong career or did not get the vocational training you needed early on in life, it is easy to become trapped in a career you do not excel in or enjoy. (But don't be disheartened if you are in this situation. Start with Step 1 and when you reach Step 3 we will help you figure out how to create a path to the work you love, regardless of where you are in your life.)
But remember that making a good living is not just what you need to invest, it is also what you are willing to charge for the work you love. Many people have a problem with this because ...
Fact #4 - Some people feel that "putting a price tag" on doing what they love will cheapen or ruin it, so they never charge what their work is worth. Many of us grew up with the belief that you had to choose either love or money - you could not have both. So some people honestly feel no one can make a living, let alone a good living, doing what they love. If you think that way, then it is likely you will ...
- Undercharge for your time, products or services
- Feel uncomfortable taking your part-time business full time and depending on it for a full salary
- Avoid taking your career or business seriously, letting it under produce and eventually falter from neglect
But avoiding making your dream work a success is not the only way to fail to make a good living at it.
Fact #5 - If you feel that there is a high risk involved in doing the work you love, you will avoid making it a reality. Many of us grew up with the ideas that doing what you love was out of the mainstream and anything out of the mainstream was risky. A natural law says that risk and reward must be balanced. (Just think about it -- you don't do something dangerous or risky unless you have a darned good reason.) The same applies to doing work we love. We perceive the financial and emotional risks are higher, so we demand a big payoff and immediate results. This often leads to expectations that our dream work must be absolutely perfect, involve no paying of dues, and immediately start earning a big salary. These unrealistic demands, which no job can fulfill, can lead us to unconsciously delay finding our dream job or starting our dream business by ...
- Never getting beyond the fantasy stage
- Bouncing around between different ideas of the ideal work instead of focusing on how to combine them
- Getting excessive training to delay starting to work
- Working on so many ideas at one time that none of them get the time and resources to be successful
Avoiding our dream job or delaying it for years is made easier by the fact that ...
Fact #6 - We focus on obstacles instead of finding solutions to the things that hold us back. It is easy to focus and grumble about the obstacles which are stopping us from doing what we love for a living. Many people think a lack of money is the culprit, and end up giving so much of their attention to the negative impact on their life that little is left over to focus on understanding and overcoming the source of the problem.
So much of our time and energy goes into coping with the stress and frustration instead of permanently eliminating it, and the problem never gets solved. You know how it goes. You feel horrible because you do not have the money you need to go back to school or take time off to change careers. So you overspend on entertainment, eating out, buying presents and other things which make you temporarily feel better and briefly forget your problems. Now you really have no money to make your dreams come true -- and that makes you feel horrible and oddly safe at the same time. Purchasing the knowledge, tools, training and resources you need to start your dream job is risky, because you are risking finding out if you are really good enough to make a good living doing what you love. For many people it feels safer to watch TV, rent a video or spend the weekend four wheeling -- than to find out whether they can make it at their dream job. (If you feel this way, check out our Quiz on What is Holding You Back From Doing Work You Love?, read about how to get unstuck, and then take the first step to discover your dream job.)
Summary
These facts give you a new way to look at the choice you have made (or will make) between love and money. We think many people see their choice as between two opposites -- making money or loving what you do.
We see the choice differently. Instead of choosing between two opposites, we see two choices that involve both love and money. First, choosing how to wisely spend your money so you love what you do. And then loving what you do enough that you choose to overcome the fear and other things that are holding you back so you can make money at it.
To make a good living doing what you love, you need to invest financially and emotionally in the work you love. Money and love are the one-two punch that allow you to achieve your dreams, because together they are an unbeatable combination.
The Next Step
If you would like to learn more about how to wisely spend your money so you love what you do ...
If you would like to learn more about what is holding you back, try our online quizzes ...
| 
