Wouldn't it be great to be able to do what you're most passionate about in life and make enough money at it so that it could be your primary source of income? You might say, "It's impossible," or "It's too late now." Nancy Anderson would passionately disagree with you. She also makes her living saying so!
In 1984, Anderson wrote Work with Passion: How to Do What You Love for a Living. It was a bestseller. She started her own career counseling business, has hosted her own radio show, and has spoken to numerous professional groups. Clearly, her message strikes a chord with those who hear it.
With the first generation of Baby Boomers inching toward retirement, Nancy's message has taken on new meaning for those who are struggling with what to do with the rest of their lives. Should they retire? Can they afford to retire? If retirement isn't in the cards, what's next? Staying on the same job (if one's so lucky)? Changing careers? Scaling back? With all these burning questions coming up, Nancy Anderson's book is right on target. Maybe it's time to do a major reassessment of one's life. Work with Passion in Midlife and Beyond: Reach Your Full Potential & Make the Money You Need is a great place to start.
Based upon the wisdom she has acquired over the years, and derived from the stories of her clients, Nancy Anderson has put forth a step-by-step process for moving into working with passion and making an adequate living doing so. At the heart of her message is in order to work with passion, self-knowledge is key.
This eight-chapter book starts with and features case studies throughout and builds upon those stories to provide her prescription for discovering one's unique passion and how to bring it into an adequate living. The beginning point is acknowledging the need for change, and to do that one has to identify one's fears - poverty, loss of love, criticism, illness, old age, death. Acknowledging and facing one's fears is a giant first step, but once done, is enormously enlightening and opens the door to an exciting voyage of self-discovery.
"First," Nancy says, "de-clutter your life!" Seriously? What does clutter have to do with finding one's passion? The oh-so-painful process of sorting one's possessions and organizing them provides valuable information about what's important and what's not, as well as how one thinks and works. So, says Anderson, take your time - reorganize your house, cut your possessions down to the bare essentials, and you will automatically un-clutter your mind to make way for finding your true passion.
After you've stripped down your physical surroundings, you're then asked to write your autobiography and to rewrite your life script. In telling your story, you'll find themes; you'll find out what's important, and ...perhaps clues as to where you should go next. You'll look at your family history in context and identify your unique life themes (i.e. conflicts with authority figures), and express gratitude for the gifts you may have received from those who have had a positive impact on your life.
Out of these seemingly monumental tasks will emerge where you have been on or off track in finding your life's passion. Next you'll identify your strengths and weaknesses and your values and needs - all clues to finding your way to working with passion. At this point, you'll be ready to set small goals, and finally you'll be ready to find your niche. This step involves lots of homework, and Anderson describes what some of her clients did to find their respective niches. The eighth and final step is arriving at your goal and savoring your success.
Work with Passion in Midlife combines philosophy, psychology, theory, and practice, and does it in highly humanistic terms. If you are looking for a classic job search book, this isn't it. This is a book for those who are introspective and looking for more than just a job, and for those who believe that age is just a number, and that it is never to late to learn something new and/or to improve ones life. Following the advice given in Work with Passion in Midlife will take time and commitment, but the rewards will be well worth the effort.
Eve Visconti's passions include writing, movies, and music. She has written numerous articles on a variety of topics both in print and on the Internet.
