you build your pension, how you pay taxes and make use of any of your country’s tax incentives or breaks.
That’s the summary; now let’s break it down.
A. How You Earn Your Bread and Butter
Be honest. Are you happy in your current job, and earning enough? Are you spending time doing what you love to do, or at least have time enough to do what you love to do, outside of work?
You need to make sure that you are happy in as many areas in your life as possible, including work. Being at a job that you are unhappy with, or a job that takes up so much of your time, makes life very difficult.
But not all of us can afford to wait until the perfect job comes along. All of us need to find a way to survive.
If you’re working at a job you only need to be in, be smart and stay in this job until a better opportunity presents itself. But don’t leave yourself all alone to deal with the misery of maintaining full time job you don’t like! If you do, you’ll only exhaust yourself, leaving you very little energy to search and remain open to finding the love of your life.
You also need to nurture your mind and body while you’re still finding better work, by:
• Finding or maintain a support group of friends and family
• Keeping yourself physically healthy and fit
• Finding ways to schedule time within the week to regularly do the things you do love
• Clearly writing down your goals in life
• Praying or meditating
• Continually scouting for better job opportunities
Meanwhile, focus all efforts on making sure that you are reasonably content in your present job.
If you’re having a particularly hard time at your present job, before you start work try grabbing your personal journal and turning to a blank page, and write down: “I am going to be happy in my job.” Remember that this is your temporary goal, which you must attain in order to move on to your bigger goals in life! Write, “I am going to be happy in my job”, over and over
again until your hand is sore from writing it. Even better, write it on every single page in your work diary, so that you’ll remind yourself of it every day. When you start feeling your stomach turn at the thought of going to work, remind yourself that, you are going to be happy at your job.
If you keep at it, you’ll be able to deal with your problem. The point is to get yourself thinking that you are truly happy in your current job. Mountains will move to make sure that you become happy in your job, so focus on getting your mindset right.
Eventually one of two things will happen: 1.) whatever it is that you disliked about your current work environment will resolve itself, or 2.) your search for a new job opportunity yields results.
But make no mistake: one of your ultimate goals in life should be to find a line of work in which you are proficient and for which you have the passion to do. Look within yourself and find where your strongest talents lie. Plan and work your way towards a career that you will naturally love to stay in, which will provide you a good income you can live with. Don’t just stay miserably in a well-paying job without making any goals of moving to a job you do love! If you hate your job, eventually you will fail at work and other aspects of your life will suffer as a result. (I know a few people who got fired from their job and temporarily lost their income, because they were bad at working on something they hated to do in the first place.) The drive and motivation to earn your keep comes from working from the heart, or working at what you like to do best. And if you build your career according to what you love to do, financial success will follow. The same drive and motivation that keeps you working will also give you enough energy to pursue higher- paying jobs, or become the best in the business and command a higher salary.
B. Your Time and Resources
Like I mentioned before, it takes more than just money to create enough wealth to power your life goals. You need time. You need experience, and a network of people to help you along, among other things.
In fact, money isn’t much without these! Although having no money may contribute to personal misery, having money on
the other hand is no guarantee you’ll find success or happiness in life. To achieve these, you need to:
• Use your money where your time and resources lie.
Apart from what you need in order to live, you shouldn’t be spending money on things that have nothing to do with your existing resources, or fair use of your time.
• Use your non-monetary resources as a means of generating money. These are your strengths, so use them to make income for yourself. If you’d like to develop more resources, use your money wisely to do so, without sacrificing your other resources.
What exactly are these non-monetary resources? They’re what you have that’s valuable to your growth as a person, to your happiness and eventual success. Some of these resources will actually allow you to command a higher salary, too.
To manage these resources, list them down and plan how to use them accordingly:
1. Talents or special abilities.
You can build an entire career out of a particular talent or ability. Look hard within yourself and know what your talents and abilities are. If you have a hard time deciding what you excel in, ask yourself what it is you like to do best. Do you love dealing with people? Or are you happier keeping track of money? Do you actually get a thrill from solving challenging problems, even under stress? Do you prefer creating ideas?