It’s true.         .          .
You may never get an Answer
if you don’t ask a Question
but it’s just as true
that sometimes the best Answers
require no Questions.          .          .

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Just what is
Q    U    I    E    T
Q U I T T I N G
and 
ARE WE
Y            O            U
actually doing it.          .          .

‘Quiet Quitting’

Is Just Setting Boundaries.

TRUE OR FALSE

T H E Y

L I F E
is what you
M A K E

T H E Y

just may be wrong. . .
It just might be
L I F E
is what you
R E A D

When I accepted the challenge to just post 7 books that I love with no explanations, no reviews; just one picture of a cover each day for a week the problem wasn’t the ‘no explanations, no review’ part; it as trying to figure out
THE SEVEN

FULL DISCLOSURE:
I could take up the challenge for the next 52 weeks or the next 30, 52 weeks and I’m still not so sure that I’d
GET IT
right
but
I T
wouldn’t matter. . .
only the reading would!

How does this rate to fit into a video Monday Caring Catalyst blog post?

R E A D I N G

is the number one thing that’s
cleared my land
plowed my field
planted seeds
watered them
cultivated
nurtured
and finally
H A R V E S T E D
a most magnificent crop
of goodness
I could ever hope to
receive
to
GIVE

So. . .
what do you read when you read. . .

The best books I’ve ever read
have ever read me
and that’s not only made all of the difference;
it’s truly made me
DIFFERENT
(f o r e v e r)

Now. . .
for THAT
n e x t
book. . .

ARE  YOU  T H A T  ARTIST

in your life.       .       .

In Another’s.         .        .

Are you The Christoper Columbus in Search of the lost Continent in you.     .     .     ?

7 lessons about finding the work you were meant to do.        .         .

I love articles like this

because they imply something magical could happen to you

if you just followed

THE STEPS

THE GUIDELINES

THE MAP

THE PERSONAL GPS

THE.     .     .THE.      .      .THE.     .     .THE.     .     .THE.     .     .THE.     .     .THE.     .    .

Emily Pidgeon

You don’t “find your calling,” you fight for it — and other lessons from people who found their passion (sometimes late in life).

Whether it was during a career aptitude test or in a heart-to-heart chat after getting laid off, chances are someone has talked to you about how to “find your calling.” It’s one of those phrases people toss about. But StoryCorps founder Dave Isay takes issue with it … specifically, the verb.

“Finding your calling — it’s not passive,” he says. “When people have found their calling, they’ve made tough decisions and sacrifices in order to do the work they were meant to do.”

In other words, you don’t just “find” your calling — you have to fight for it. And it’s worth the fight. “People who’ve found their calling have a fire about them,” says Isay, the winner of the 2015 TED Prize. “They’re the people who are dying to get up in the morning and go do their work.”

Over a decade of listening to StoryCorps interviews, Isay noticed that people often share the story of how they discovered their calling — and now, he’s collected dozens of great stories on the subject into a new book, Callings: The Purpose and Passion of Work. Below, he shares 7 takeaways from the hard-won fight to find the work you love.

1. Your calling is at the intersection of a Venn diagram of three things: doing something you’re good at, feeling appreciated, and believing your work is making people’s lives better. “When those three things line up, it’s like lightning,” Isay says. He doesn’t suggest that a person has to be a surgeon saving lives to feel like they have a calling; think of the diner waitress who talks to customers and makes them feel loved. How do you find this overlap? “You have to shut out all the chatter of what your friends are telling you to do, what your parents are telling you to do, what society is telling you to do,” Isay says, “and just go to that quiet place inside you that knows the truth.”

2. Your calling often comes out of difficult experiences. What lurks in that quiet place will be a defining experience — quite possibly a painful one. Isay points to an interview in Callings with 24-year-old teacher Ayodeji Ogunniyi. “He was studying to be a doctor when his father was murdered. He realized that what he was really meant to do was be a teacher,” says Isay. “He says that every time he walks into a classroom, his father is walking in with him.” This theme of people turning their hardest experiences into a new path runs throughout the book. “Having an experience that really shakes you and reminds you of your mortality can be a very clarifying event in people’s lives. Oftentimes, it leads to changes,” he says. “We spend a lot of time working, so it can really change your priorities in terms of work life.”

3. Calling often takes courage and ruffles feathers. Elsewhere in Callings, we hear about Wendell Scott, who became the first African-American NASCAR driver in 1952, and kept on driving despite threats against his life. From scientist Dorothy Warburton who dealt with extreme sexism as she conducted research to break the stigma around miscarriage. From Burnell Cotlon, who opened the first grocery store in the Lower 9th Ward after Hurricane Katrina because he wasn’t about to let his old neighborhood’s spirit fade. Calling, says Isay, very often starts with taking a stand against a status quo that simply isn’t acceptable, and then dedicating your work to changing it: “It’s work ignited by hope, love, or defiance — and stoked by purpose and persistence.”

4. Other people often nudge you toward calling. Sharon Long had worked odd jobs most of her life. As Isay tells it, “Her daughter was going to college, and as the bursar was helping them with financial aid forms, she said quietly to herself, ‘I wish I could’ve gone to college.’ The bursar responded, ‘It’s not too late.’” Sharon enrolled in an art program, and on her advisor’s suggestion, took forensic anthropology as her science. “The advisor suggested it for no other reason than he thought it was the easiest science course for the science requirement,” says Isay. “But the minute she sat in that class, it was boom — this is what she was meant to do.” Isay tells this story to illustrate how calling, while very personal, is also relational. “People bump you this way and that way,” he says, often without realizing it. “When people find their callings, they want to honor those people who helped them get there.”

5. What comes after identifying your calling is what really matters. The old ‘finding your calling’ phraseology makes it sound like a calling is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow — you find it, and the story’s over. But Isay stresses that your calling is an ongoing process. “Understanding what your calling is — that’s very different than the blood, sweat and tears of actually doing it,” he says. Pursuing a calling may require going back to school or apprenticing; it may require starting a business. Often, notes Isay, it leads a person into a line of work that’s in service of others. “This book is basically a love letter to nurses, teachers, social workers — the people who don’t often get celebrated for the work they do,” he says.

6. Age is irrelevant. Isay found his calling when he was 21 and interviewed a man who’d been part of the Stonewall riots. “The minute I hit record, I knew that being a journalist and interviewing people was what I was going to do for the rest of my life,” he says. “I feel very lucky that lightning struck when I was very young.” But collecting stories for the book reminded him that a calling can be discovered at any age. The book includes an interview with someone who knew they wanted to be an NBA referee at age 15, and another who worked as an accountant for 30 years before discovering his passion for slicing lox. “Doing the work you’re meant to do is one of the most satisfying, remarkable experiences that a person can have,” says Isay, “so never give up.”

7. Calling often doesn’t come with a big paycheck. Another trend Isay sees in stories of people who find their calling: they often involve leaving a high-paying job for one that’s lower-paying but more satisfying. “The message we send to young people is that you want to do as little work as you can to make as much money as you can — that’s the dream,” says Isay. “But the wisdom in the StoryCorps archive is that there’s another, much more rewarding dream of taking risks and working very hard to live with integrity.” In the end, that’s the lesson he took away from writing this book. “There are no millionaires, no billionaires, no celebrities, nobody with a big Twitter following,” he says. “Just stories can teach us a lot about lives fully lived.”

Even more powerful is this one single, revelation:

The DEBUNKING of one of the worst lies ever told to you,

made even more devastating because it’s told to you by people you love;

People you admire; look up to; respect.          .          .

YOU HAVE A PURPOSE.          .          .
(NO  YOU  DON’T)

YOU HAVE A MEANING.          .          .
(THAT’S  A  LIE)

YOU HAVE A DESTINY.            .          .
(THAT’S  A  BUNCH  OF  BUNK)

YOU HAVE A REASON.             .          .
(THAT’S A CROCK OF SOMETHING STANKY YOU DON’T WANT IN YOUR PANTRY)

T          R          U          T          H :

You don’t have a Purpose

You don’t have a Meaning

You don’t have a Destiny

You don’t have a Reason.          .          .

THEY   ARE   PLURAL.          .          .

Not   SINGULAR

The Purpose
The Meaning
The Destiny
The Reason

Y   O   U

had as a infant wasn’t the one you had as a toddler or a pre-schooler or in junior high or when you graduated from high school, college, with your first full time job, when you got married, had kids, got divorced, remarried, more kids, another career, moved, had grandkids, retired.          .          .

F          A           C          T :

You’ve had more Purposes,
You’ve had more Meanings,
You’ve had more Destinies,
You’ve had more Reasons

slip through your hands than you’ve ever taken advantage;

THEY  ARE  ENDLESS

and FOREVER CHURNING IN YOU

WHAT’S     THE     USE(S)

what indeed for

N                    O                    W

How.       .       .

H   O   W           D   O           Y   O   U           D   O           I   T ? 

How   do   you

B U R N      Y O U R      C A N D L E ?

Some do it in the most unconventional way.       .       .

t  h  e  y

actually light their candle

by putting a little dancing flame

on the tip of a small wick

that accepts it gratefully

and in return for the gift,

sputters out some warmth and light.       .      .

But how do you burn your candle?

One  End?

Both  Ends?

In   the   Middle?

You don’t burn your Candle at all.       .       .

you use it as a Decoration?

There have been countless studies on how to avoid burn out.         .         .

maybe the greatest way to avoid  Burn-Out

is simply never to Light the Candle at all

.           .          .but who wants to live in that

c o l d    d a r k n e s s ?

Apparently.        .        .

a whole host of folks.        .        .

Y     O     U ?

The only true way to

Burn    Your    Candle

i s

Both   Ends   and   in   the   Middle

AS     LONG     AS     YOU     KNOW    

WHERE     TO     GET     THE     WAX     AND     THE     WICK

Pssssssssst:  We all know where  OUR  wax and wick are.        .        .

we just don’t take the time to go and get it!

In fact,

most have the audacity to actually think

it should be delivered to them on time,

without even ordering

or slowing down long enough

to receive the special shipment.

So the next time someone prescribes the ultimate antidote for Burn Out by

FINDING   TIME   TO   DECOMPRESS

TAKING   FREQUENT   BREAKS   THROUGH  OUT   THE   DAY

WATCHING   WHAT   YOU   EAT   AND   DRINK

EXERCISING.      .      .EVEN   MODERATELY 

GETTING   PLENTY   OF   REST   AND   SLEEP

INVESTING   SIGNIFICANTLY   IN   RELATIONSHIPS

SETTING   LIMITS   AND   NOT   CHOOSING   TO   DIE   ON   EVERY   HILL

PAYING   ATTENTION   TO   HOW   YOU   REALLY   FEEL   AND    W H Y

Part of not only  b e i n g

 but by maintaining

the honorable status of a Caring Catalyst

is not just recognizing,

but actually taking just a few mere seconds to

burn a little bit brighter

burn a little bit warmer

by going to get

YOUR WAX

YOUR WICK

to burn the Candle at both ends and in the Middle

W   H   E   R   E  ?

Simply to  that  place

that makes your Heart beat differently

that makes your Soul glow

that makes your Spirt soar

Shhhhhhhhhhhh.     .     .

How long has it been?

Has it even been with what you are currently doing?

Is  it  just  your  hobby?

.          .          .and you want to know the truest reason for Burn-Out?

Ask the Composer

who never put never fingers to keyboard

Ask the Artist

who never dabbed brush to canvas

Ask the Writer

who never put pen to paper

Ask the Sculptor

who never put chisel to marble or hand to clay

.        .      .the   flame   never   brought   to   wick.       .       .       

Want to end Burn Out ?

FIND   YOURSELF   AND

D O

B E

Y O U R

T R U E S T

I  T

and  experience  

a  light  and a  warmth

unrivaled but  n o n e:

Y          O          U          R      ‘     S

Be more of

 Y  O  U  R      S  T  O  R  Y 

and less of

T  H  E  I  R     S  T  U  F  F .       .       .  

Ain’t it grand

Ain’t it majestic

Ain’t it glorious

Ain’t it perpetual ?

Pssssssssst: This is one thing you can bet your life on.     .     .

or

burn out!

Why be a

G    L    I    M    M    E   R

when  you  can  be  a

G           L           O           W

.        .       .        ?