March 16, 2015Love the Work, Hate the Boss? Transform to Create Opportunities at Work and Home
by Daisy Swanwww.DaisySwan.comWorking for a boss who you butt heads with is never pleasant. In fact, studies show most people leave their jobs because of a bad relationship with their boss. So it won't surprise you that many of my clients come to me because they want to leave a boss they can't bear to work with anymore even though the work may be just what they want. Below are actions anyone can take to shift their perspective and find new solutions to workplace strife.
1. The grass is greener where you water it. Start looking for ways to water the dry, barren land of your relationship with your boss. A client of mine, in a frustrating and difficult relationship with her boss, began doing a regular 10 minutes a day mindfulness practice that I taught her.
We agreed she would begin cultivating compassion for herself and others through a meditation focused on kindness. She was surprised to notice how quickly her thoughts transformed about who her boss was as a woman, and what triggered their difficulties together.
My client's curiosity began to open up...which toes might she be stepping on without awareness? And why wasn't she connecting with her peers?
2. Notice opportunities to connect with others. As her stillness practice continued, my client found more opportunities for micro changes in how she could contribute positively with her boss and coworkers. She turned her attention towards learning about, and being with, her co-workers instead of looking mostly at what she wanted to develop for herself at work.
Paradoxically, as she shifted her attention to include others, she began to get more of what she wanted, too.
3. Invest in your happiness outside of work. Instead of coming home aggravated and resigned to numbing herself in front of the TV each evening, my client started paying attention to her own creative projects.
She learned new techniques and technology to create some of the ideas she'd been mulling. She found she loved making art with new software she found. Remarkably, co-workers began asking what had happened to her, and that she seemed so different at work, happier and easier to be with. Her happiness shifted those relationships at work, and with her own creativity.
4. Continue a regular mindful awareness practice at home, but also with others. As my client found a way to find more peace in herself, she chose to look for places where she could meet others who also chose to meditate.
By spending time at various meditation centers now and again she met more people who in turn became a part of her larger network of friends and associates.
Daisy Swan is a mindful awareness meditation trainer with 21st Century Attention Meditation Services;
www.21stCenturyAttention.com, as well as founder of Daisy Swan & Associates,
www.DaisySwan.com, a career coaching firm that supports clients of all ages across all career paths to find and create the lives they long for. Permission granted for use on DrLaura.com.
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