Your Career and You: "I found a day!"

Once in a while I seem to not have my head glued on completely. For those of you who have already crossed my path, you know this.

My students...my undergrad Communication students at Curry College in particular, but also my grad students at Regis College...figure this out fast.

I'm known for saying: “Of all the things I’ve lost in life, I miss my mind the most.”

Ø  Absent-minded? Yes.

Ø  Disorganized? Absolutely.

But I’ve learned over the years to roll with those minor afflictions and, most of the time, to find a way to capitalize on the outcome.

This week is a case in point.

I am a long-time member of the Board of Directors of Boston Harborfest, a nonprofit organization that coordinates a week-long series of events in Boston that attract thousands of people from New England and around the world.

As part of my involvement, I volunteer my time to help out where needed…in the Information Booth that will be located on Boston’s City Hall Plaza and as the ticket-collector at the gate for Chowderfest.

Well…I signed up for my stint in the Information Booth and dutifully blocked the hours off on my calendar (10 a.m. – 2 p.m.) for the Monday I would be there.

I then went about organizing the day and the remainder of the week.

Easy enough.

But…

I realized this morning as I was eating breakfast that I had marked off the wrong date...I was a week early in my planning.

Instead of getting all flustered and chewing myself out for being (for me) “normal,” though, I was delighted.

I “found a day”! A day for which nothing is scheduled!!

I now have an “extra” day that I can use to take care of some projects that I have been putting off “until I had time.”

Ø  I can write posts for this blog as well as for “Waxing Unlyrical,” an amazing blog created and managed by the equally amazing Shonali Burke.

Ø  I also can continue reading The Social Media Bible and preparing for my new course at Curry… “Social Media Communication.”

I have time!!

I know this sounds a little weird, but there’s a point to this.

The lesson we should learn, to re-phrase my South Park idols’ favorite saying, is that flexibility is key to job…and life…satisfaction.

Things don’t always go as planned.

Ø  Meetings get cancelled…or scheduled…at the last minute.

Ø  Clients “remember” projects that they “absolutely must have completed by the end of the day” (Friday, usually) at noon on Friday.

Ø  The electricity goes out.

The “trick” is to quickly identify an alternative solution or course of action.

It can be maddening at first, especially if you are like my wife, who plans everything out to the N^th degree. She absolutely loathes schedule changes…sees them as a direct insult.

But, over the course of some 40 years of marriage, she has mellowed and has learned how to adapt…to either find something else to fill in the unscheduled gap or (gasp!) simply do nothing…to relax and enjoy the downtime.

I’m not suggesting doing nothing if you are in the workplace. What I am suggesting is that you learn to adapt quickly and quietly.

Not only will you find yourself less stressed. You very likely will impress others around you with your adaptability and ability to “roll with the punches.”

Trust me…It's possible, and that’s a good thing!

“'There’s no use trying,’ she said: ‘One can’t believe impossible things.’

‘I daresay you haven’t had much practice,’ said the Queen. ‘When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.’” – Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter’” [1865]