Implicit rules

Who has access to what data and who has access to particular revenues? Enterprises and their employees are connected these days by little more than temporary convenience. This renders obligations and duties less tight. People come and go quite readily. Wages are less predicable. The idea of working for others was originally seen as a step toward more freedom in economic independence where people would have more control over what they charge for their services.

Are you part of an entrepreneurial group? Do you feel like part of a professional team? You may work on a team project and take a percentage of money earned by a project. More people work in teams or office projects than alone. As time passes, your income will continue to depend on how much clients will be willing to pay for your services. What do you wish to offer?

How you make a living can be linked to how you percieve your talents. What do you think you can do? Are you doing what you would really like to do? You may determine what you like to do but be unaware how you can make money from that. Some people work one job while they reflect on how they can make enough money to survive and prosper from what they really like doing. Dreams are those things you work toward and they nurture hope and motivation.

Steady work with predictable rises in pay of the past is rarely the norm today. Experience and maturity had nothing to do with job classifications. Everyone was paid in exchange for time. Yet, tacit rules of employment have essentially disappeared. Most people still rely on wages or salaries, yet consistent streams of income are less predictable, except for a handful of professionals. They rise and fall based on the rise and fall buyers make. A job that is permanent may still have tidal salaries, based on things like billable hours, stock options, and sales statistics. Impermanence is the standard. Uncertainty requires people redefine security.

Personal versus maket success

We each have our own internal logic about success.  This relates to our personalities and skills. How could you evolve from an information broker into a knowledge broker?  How could you become more adaptable to the marketplace and provide more personalized services that reframe your value? What can you do to show people what you can offer that isn't common-place? 

Consider computer programmers.  They understand the logic of what's possible in certain conditions.   They develop software that has widespread, practical uses.  This may give them a sense of accomplishment, but they may unaware how to promote a profitable, market success.

Consider creative people need to learn to ask the right questions, to observe behaviour cues, elicit and intuit human needs.  They are empathic and understand what is desired before a desire surfaces in the marketplace.  These people find unexpected market opportunities for what the computer programmers devise. When logical thinkers pair up with creative thinkers, they may create a greater sense of personal and marketable success. 

Businesses are supposed to create value over time to bring a financial return to shareholders.  Depending on your contribution to a business,  whether you're an investor, an employee, a business owner, a customer, you would see value and success differently.  Success can be seen as reflected in customer loyalty, while it could also be seen in the form of profit, increasing share price, greater popularity, better accessibility, and even more competitive prices.  

One kind of success is not more important or better than another.  Each person creates a hierarchy.  Every great idea comes not only in making a discovery, but also in how the discovery can be used.  Mutual learning and innovation tends to be serendipitous, and grows out of casual exchanges without high pressure.  The impetus for innovation comes from each of us.

Find the bright side

No matter what kind of condition or life circumstances you know and have known, a bright side exists. You can always train or untrain the mind to notice this.  Its a blessing to do so.

For instance, if it is raining outside, and this appears to spoil your plans, you can shift focus to be grateful for the nutrients this brings to the flowers and greenery. You can be grateful for the moisture that renews the Earth, that gives you water to drink, and enables you to do something you would not otherwise have done. You can see rain as opening the way to see the sun. Even an electric storm can be viewed as a form of relief for Nature and much more.

The same can be said for every person you ever know, every job you've ever had, every event that has ever unfolded in front of you. If you feel cheated or betrayed, you can find something positive about the same situation. You can focus what appears to be lacking or what insight, opportunity or wisdom you are gaining. What did you learn about yourself that you wouldn't have seen otherwise? It is valuable to step outside the judging mind.

If you feel you have reason to resign from your job, then you can choose to see that as the best possible thing that could happen, and feel excited about what is coming next. After all, to be your own boss or to find a different job more suitable to your skills would be marvelous!

Consider how an unforeseen injury that laid you up a few weeks enabled you to read the books you hadn't made time to read before. Perhaps you benefit from a reminder to relax and be kinder to yourself. Every event invites you to be more compassionate with yourself and others.  To recognize you have ability to see your life situation from another perspective is something that helps you, come what may.

Wherever you are, whatever you do, you can re-program your mind.  What will it take to convince yourself that you have blessings in your life? Start believing your relationships will be restored, that opportunities already exist for you and you choose to see them or not. As you start expecting good things to happen, then you reach a stage where this is all you see.  Know you pass your tests with flying colors. Recognize everything is preparing you for something else. You are being readied for conditions which are better for you than before. Sensing the bright side strengthens more than eyesight. It moves you from hope to trust.

"Always look on the bright side of life." - Monty Python

Humbling

When was the last time you had an experience that was humbling? You know, this is the type of thing that puts you back in your place when, up to that point, you felt like nothing could stand in the way of what you were doing. 

“ Experience is the best teacher, but a fool will learn from no other. ” 

-Benjamin Franklin

Explain the inexplicable

Do you dream of clarifying the inexplicable? Cat got your tongue? Those words you desire simply escape you?  How easy it is to misinterpret the behavior of a character and assume that he is reliable when it turns out he isn't.  By reading more into gestures, method, and possible motives, the miracle of understanding arises.  This may come after a character has pulled a stunt you find inconceivable.  A chance remark by a complete stranger may draw your attention to things you missed. 

To focus on the inexplicable is an invitation to re-examine your disbelief.  People we care about make mistakes, but its not necessarily in our nature to focus on weaknesses or problems.  The same can be said for fictional characters we identify with and appreciate in some way.  Its disagreeable to stop liking them simply because of something they do that rubs us the wrong way.  Why not then chalk it up to experience as a way to explain the inexplicable. 

As you learn to open your mind, you realize that what you thought made no sense was based on a lack of information or a hesitation to believe the truth.  You always believe what you choose to believe.  You close your mind off because you refuse to be open to something new, something you didn't know before.  As you read, you discover the unexpected is actually to be expected.  If you're honest with yourself, you will begin to see your life in a similar way.  Change will happen, whether you accept it and choose to get something positive out of it is completely up to you.