A favorite article of mine, Manage Your, Energy not Your Time, by Tony Schwartz, has a couple of sentences that I try to remind myself of daily…
“What story am I telling myself?” And then, “What other story can I tell myself?”
I have a client, who when we first started working together, told me that “If I died in my office no one would find me for weeks.”
That was the story he was telling himself. About how isolated and alone he was at work.
I remember leaning across the table at the Le Pain Quotidian where we met over lunch. I told him, “You can leave this job if you want to.” “Really?” he asked.
Our work helped him get him on his way. He did leave that job. He took a year off. He traveled. He wrote and produced a TV show with a friend.
He decided to get back into law and did some temporary work.
That lead to a full-time job at a global firm, but in an in-house roll. Now he gets to leave at a reasonable hour every night and have dinner with his partner.
The story he’s telling himself about his time as an associate in big law firm is…
“If I did that, I can do anything.”
So… what’s a story you are telling yourself? Then ask, “What’s another story I could tell myself?”
See what happens.
If you are a lawyer who wants more freedom, autonomy, and clarity about your next career steps, I would love to see if I could help you. Please reach out here.