How the advice affected me: I never even thought about working for state government until someone else mentioned it to me. Then, I thought it would be cool because I could have some kind of impact and make things better-more efficient and effective. Public service, how noble and rewarding, right? I worked at one agency, got frustrated, felt I could still make a difference; moved to another agency, same thing and another. Finally, I got so frustrated I made the jump to the private sector. Unfortunately, the unusually cool sounding start up with coworkers from some of the top schools in the country was an unethical pyramid scheme full of douche bags, so I reverted back to the public sector. What I have learned is that for any free thinker with ambition and the ability to actually improve the bloated, constipated condition of our government, state work is a soul sucking, mind numbing, black hole of frustration and career stagnation.
Do not pass go, do not pay union dues, do not collect over inflated pension.
Where I thought I’d be in 5-10 years: I figured I’d be a foreign service officer in an awesome place like Australia, or otherwise working in foreign relations fostering international business and trade between the U.S. and other nations. I also figured I’d speak at least 4 languages and have done some extensive world travel.
Where I am now: Finally taking action. I have always been a late bloomer, but I let myself get stuck too long and spent far too much time complaining and doing nothing. I started reading IWT last year. The material called me on my BS and put me in my place. Wapish! I used the 30 day course on hustling to secure a position as a freelance communications consultant for a solar thermal energy start up. I expanded my network, offered free work via email, got a dinner meeting, busted out the briefcase technique-I gave them a plan. By the end of dinner, they wanted me on board. Granted, I’m working for free because the company is still in the R&D phase, but the experience and connections I’ve made are well worth it. The communications consulting gig is not my dream job. In fact, I applied for the dream job scholarship, but my first ever web video, was pretty damn awful.
I still have my crappy day job but am working my way out by implementing IWT dream job material coupled with insights from Tim Ferriss-The 4-Hour Workweek. I have niched down my preferences and am starting to reach out to appropriate contacts. Since I struggle with reaching out to others for help and am generally an introvert, I am finding the comfort challenges presented in 4-Hour Workweek crucial to any dream job progress. The comfort challenges offer specific actionable steps you can take to get yourself out of your comfort zone and moving forward. Even just seeing what some of the comfort challenges are makes reaching out to others for help finding a dream job seem a lot less daunting. I am also using language learning techniques from the 4-Hour workweek blog to revamp my Spanish so I can actually use it when I travel to Costa Rica in a couple of months and aim to become fluent in 3-6 months as at least one potential dream job of mine involves me being fluent in multiple languages.
- Megan
