Priya Parker has proposed crazy but effective seven steps to eliminate FEAR about quitting your current career/job to choose things you are really passionate in life! She has given interesting 7 steps that will help you to switch career to follow your heart! The steps are helpful in transition stage when you have decided (or wish) to quit your current career but not sure how you will land to your dream career. It will help you to analyse your mental, emotional, physical and financial stage before switching to new exciting but unexpected life.
All these crazy things given in talk will help you to build your muscles for discomfort and remove your fear. Her experience while dealing with many successful people (who could actually quit their past career and reboot) is that; the successful people had actually managed to live in uncomfortable situations and manage fear in life.
Seven steps to check your strength & weaknesses, interest/passion of life , limits/constrains, etc to reboot life; which are discussed in Priya’s TED talk , are described below:
STEP 1 (Mental & Emotional level)- Take the obituary test and make sure you pass: Write down your Obituary on paper. Answering basic questions like; how do you I want to live my life? etc.
STEP 2 (Mental & Emotional level) – Passion comic strip: What passion do you have? Interview 5-10 close people ask them When they have seen you happy? Draw on paper cartoon series about your passion and thing you wish to do or did till now.
STEP 3 (Physical & Emotional)- Get comfortable with this concept: Build your muscles for discomfort i.e. get habituated with awkward and humiliating situations in life! Just for the experiment she has suggested following 3 crazy ways –
- (a) Start singing in public places when in queue or standing. Notice your emotions inside the body (heart),and feelings while doing this.
- (b) Go outside for dinner alone (habit of staying alone), without reading material, mobile or anything to entertain
- (c) Stand-up facing back towards door in a lift (different from others)
STEP 4 (Mental & Emotion)- Life Sentence: Give yourself a life sentence, like many organization and companies generally have their mission and vision statements. Ask questions like, What do I value? What is purpose of my life?,etc see below:
-
A. What are the qualities and values that I bring with me (regardless of family or at work)?
-
B. What is that I actually Do?
-
C. Why I do all this? It is most difficult but important task. It helps in analysing your life and help you to make future decision-making about life
STEP 5 (Finance)- Dwindling-Cash Experiment: To check how much money is enough money for you to live a normal life. In this experiments you first note down how much money you spend on yourself per month (not how much you earn) . Take that amount from bank and put it in an envelope. Then divide it into 4 parts (40%, 30%, 20% and 10% of total). Then expose yourself to 4 different money parts one in each week. Start with 40% money for first week, then 30% in next week, etc. Note down what you did in each week and how did you manage e.g. live with this much money for one week each to know how much money is sufficient for you/your habits/constraints/spending pattern, mind-set, etc. Find out what amount you are comfortable with and live on. Build a financial model and see how much you need to “reboot” your life.
STEP 6 (Mental) – Help Somebody else: Identify 5 different friends/person who are doing different and interesting jobs. Ask them whether you can spend 1 hour with them to solve any of their difficult problem in their business. It will build habit , how can I help others and realize which problems you can/can’t solve ( your strength weakness analysis).
STEP 7 (Mental & Emotional) – Social accountability & PR: Invite your 7 ‘close’ friends and tell them about your plan of quitting current job and rebooting life. Note their Suggestions and reactions. This will help you to know about your Social accountability and PR groups practice.
Priya has summarized her talk with quotes: “Step back from your life to see clearly… Don’t avoid thinking about the meanings just because it scares you. Changes in the universe are very hard to make, but they are even harder to make if you don’t spend time thinking about what matters to you. Imagine the consciousness in the History of not doing the things, if Leonardo da Vinci hadn’t stuck to his plan or if Albert Einstein had remain the Patent Officer…Changing the Universe needs time , Space and Risk. So, I urge to you, think about what matters to you, what makes you to come alive and think about wants actually happening in the world. Then think critically and deeply about how you want to dive in, other wise you might be cheating your future that you have to give”. See her full TED talks below.
Hope these eye opener talks and crazy suggestions will help you to follow your heart! 🙂 It’s up to you to decide how you choose your path and start walking!
Priya Parker on “How to Quit fear (and reboot) @ TEDxUHasselt
Priya Parker on ‘The fear of missing out’ @ TEDXCambridge
Another excellent talk about doing thinks in life and what we are missing.
Follow Priya Parker @ Twitter
Note: Please do not copy or paste without written permission. It takes lots of efforts to gather and provide interesting stuffs here. You can share link of this blog with appropriate credits to GlobIndian blog.
For more interesting stuffs follow GlobIndian Blog @ Facebook @ Twitter
Image source: “en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dune_Soaring_Paraglider.png”
Sources: TEDx, google search, PriyaParker webpage, Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and other hyperlinks in the post.
GLOBAL INDIAN BLOG 