Welcome to Episode #242 of the Own Your Best Life Podcast.

Here’s something no one tells you: the confusion is normal. More normal than anyone admits.

I think even the people who look like they have it all figured out feel it. The lawyer, the doctor, the person in the role you’d assume is settled for life. They still wonder how to make it work, what they actually want, what to do with all the potential that hasn’t been used yet. No matter the field, there comes a point where you start asking, what do I want next? Maybe that’s a new role. Maybe it’s a change in how you’re living. Or maybe you just know that the way you’re working right now isn’t working anymore.

The playbook runs out.

Early on, we’re handed a playbook. Go to school. Get the job. Build the family. Maybe go back to school. And you do those things, and then one day you look up and realize there are decades ahead of you that nobody planned for. There’s no playbook for those.

So you do the thing we all do. You start looking around at everyone else, certain they have it figured out. You open LinkedIn and play compare-and-despair. Everyone looks settled, happy, sure of themselves. You might not even want their life, but at least they seem content with theirs.

And meanwhile you’re a little bored. Maybe your health is starting to slip. Maybe you don’t have the time you want. Maybe you’re burning out again, or you feel a lack of autonomy and flexibility, and you can’t make room for the things that actually matter to you.

You know something needs to change. That’s why you’re here. Whether it’s unmet potential, or wanting a life where you get to do the things you’re interested in, or feeling like you have a calling you’re not answering, or simply wanting to make enough money without sacrificing your peace of mind to get it. Your intuition is telling you things can be different.

That feeling isn’t a problem to silence. It’s information.

What you actually need is a plan

Here’s what I’ve learned coaching accomplished women through exactly this: you usually don’t need to blow up your life. You need a plan.

You need to design your next chapter the same way you’d design a work project that matters to you. That level of intention rarely shows up in our own lives, because we’re so busy keeping up with everything we feel we have to do, for work, for family, for our health, that we’re barely treading water. Making the time to plan is part of the work. It’s exactly what we do inside the Spiritual Achiever® program.

So while you’re in this phase of not being sure, here are a few things to do, and a few things to avoid.

Do: get help. Avoid: staying stuck another year.

You have the option to not be stuck for another year. But we tend to dip a toe in. We talk to one person one time, don’t feel instant clarity, and decide it didn’t work. Think about that. You’ve been doing what you’ve been doing for years, maybe decades, and you still don’t feel clear. One conversation was never going to turn you into a real swimmer who can do laps and actually compete.

And if you’re thinking about leaving, please don’t leave without a plan. I won’t tell you to never leave, because sometimes a situation is genuinely untenable and going is the right call. But I’ve watched people walk away with no plan, start to feel like they’re drowning, and grab any job just to be able to think again. Leaving with a plan, with help secured, with someone in your corner who can help you figure out what’s next, is a completely different thing. If you can stay and make it work while you figure it out, I’d encourage you to consider it.

Do: get experience that matters. Avoid: sacrificing the moments you can’t get back.

Get more experience in the things that count. There are so many new tools and technologies worth learning, and one of the best ways to show up well for the next part of your career is to feel genuinely good about what you’re doing now. When nothing seems to be happening where you are, you start to assume nothing’s happening anywhere. That feeling of being stymied perpetuates itself. But momentum builds momentum. When you master what’s in front of you, even the parts you don’t love, that “if I can do this, I can do the next thing” energy starts to grow.

Here’s what to avoid. Don’t give up the life moments you can’t get back. That drive to do the one extra thing to take it over the top is strong, especially for high achievers. And some of those choices, about where you spent your time and what you missed, you will regret. You won’t always see it in the moment, so have compassion for yourself. But know that the urge to work and drive and produce will always be there. The window for being present at the moments that matter will not. Learn the difference between obsessing over something you love and obsessing because you’re afraid you’re not good enough.

Do: see it as a beginning. Avoid: treating it as a dead end.

Try to see this confusion as a new beginning. Something in you, call it soul or intuition or spirit, is nudging you toward something that’s about to start, and the discomfort you feel is part of that beginning. What I’d avoid is seeing it as a full stop, as proof that this is it.

I teach a lot on change management, and one of the most important distinctions is this: change happens on the outside. Point A to point B. You lost the job. The org restructured. Your boss changed. You can see it. But the transition is internal. I don’t stay stuck for long, because I know that inner process is the actual work. Not needing to be right, not needing it to look a certain way, not holding on. Because even when we’re right about something, we’re often not happy. I’d rather be happy. I’d rather ride the waves than fight them, because that brings me far more peace.

Do: connect with people. Avoid: hiding.

Grow your network, not because you have to, but because there’s so much benefit in asking for help and being among other people when you’re stuck.

What I’d avoid is hiding. So many people hide because they’re embarrassed about a career they don’t think is impressive enough, or because they think they should have done something else, or because they made a promise to themselves they didn’t keep. Whatever it is, releasing that shame is the key. This is real life. On the real field, in the real game, we get back up. We work alongside other people. We don’t hide in the locker room and refuse to play.

I want you out here playing. There’s so much fun to be had, so much to build, so many breakthroughs and new experiences waiting. The hiding keeps us more broke, more stuck, and more lonely than we need to be. Opening up in your moments of confusion is a practice in showing up among other people without total certainty, and still knowing you’re a peer, just as valuable and just as worthy. Because so much of this is confidence, and the moment we feel a little off, that confidence starts to slip. And when it slips, we’re less audacious, less creative, less curious, and we miss the synchronicities that only happen when we’re really engaged in life.

Create the plan.

So when you think about designing your next chapter, know that the confusion is normal. But also know that a plan is what lets you live the best life you can imagine, because a plan you create is a very different plan than the one handed to you by everyone around you.

So create it. Own your best life.

If you want help building yours, this is exactly the work we do inside Spiritual Achiever® Coaching. It’s a year-long program where we figure out what you actually want, what your unique zone of genius is, and how to bring it into the world in a way that doesn’t burn you out, with some fun along the way. And over the next few weeks I’m building toward something to help you think all of this through, all the way to your next chapter. So stay close.

When you’re ready, head to mayempson.com/contact to reach out and learn more. I can’t wait to talk with you about what’s next.

If you join Spiritual Achiever coaching now, you can join the Work Optional challenge in June and have access to join us in the work. This isn’t about quitting your job right now. This is about creating options, freedom and doing better than you’ve ever done in your work in the process. 

Spiritual Achiever coaching is my year-long transformational coaching experience for professionals who want clarity and capacity while being coached at the highest level.

You can learn more or start a conversation at:
www.mayempson.com/contact

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