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Your job sucks because your work relationships be strugglin'!

You're not connecting with your colleagues.

You currently connect with them inauthentically.

Or you don't connect with them at all.

When I worked in office jobs I couldn't stand, I bolted during my lunch breaks.

• "These people can't relate to me."
• "And I don't relate them to."
• "Why would I want to spend any more time than necessary around them?"

I was more interested in getting the hell up out of there than to see these people as valuable humans.
These beings that I shared so much space and time with.

You may say, "Meh, it doesn't matter."

But it does matter.

When I started having lunch with my co-workers, going to happy hour, taking walk-n-talk breaks with them, getting to know 'em, AND letting them know me..my job didn't suck so much.

Feeling connected contributed to a delicious sense of well-being.

Stop holding your well-being hostage.

Stop isolating. 

• Say yes the next time the group invites you to lunch.
• Ask your supe about their personal goals in 5 years.
• Take a 10-min walking break with that chill person on the 4th floor.
• Tell your project partner why you started painting.

After all this you may still dislike your job, but it won't suck the way it does now.

And you never know...your next job lead could come from one of your co-workers.

I'd love to help you with personalized guidance to create kickass connections at work WHILE we create and execute your exit plan into your new career.

You want to leave your current job. So you applied to another job. But honestly though? You’re not crazy about that job either.

You wish you could pursue other interests and ideas instead. You think the answer might be to start your own business.

But how do you know which idea to go with?

Consider these three things.

Combine your interests into one idea.

That’s what I did.

I explored desired possibilities as I worked in full-time office jobs I wasn’t particularly crazy about. I considered my love for and experience with inspirational speaking, acting, on-camera hosting, emceeing, life coaching, writing, and performing/teaching dance and fitness.

I had pursued several of these independently, but I wanted to experience all of them in one setting.

My business Feel Good Kick Ass began as a hybrid movement and coaching service in 2015. My signature offering was the Rock Your Life Danceshops™, for which I was, and am still, proud of creating. I inspired and coached groups of people while entertaining them in the context of a dance/movement experience with content I wrote. Boom!  All my interests in one idea.

Explore a hybrid possibility for your own endeavor.


Seek outside perspectives.

If you can’t see a way to combine your ideas, involve someone else in your process. Your proximity to your own circumstance might prevent you from seeing what a skilled problem-solver can see. With a little help you just might figure out the hybrid model for your new career or business. Let me make it real easy for you. Message me for a free consultation.


Just pick one.

If you prefer to choose one path but don't know which one to pick, be careful not to set up residence in the contemplation zone. This is where you vacillate for a ridiculous amount of time. Two years go by and you're still thinking which interest to pursue.

Massive indecision ensures you'll never have to risk failure. Letting yourself stay stuck in confusion is a clever way your unconscious mind keeps you safe. New endeavors mean danger to the primitive brain. Your rational thinking mind knows you're OK. Go ahead and choose a path.

Imagine that all your interests were guaranteed to be successful. If that were the case, which one would you enjoy doing more? If you knew that, no matter what you did, your path was going to thrive and be prosperous, then it’s just a matter of selecting the more appealing path.

I learned this decision-making technique from my coach Brooke and it has helped me. Try it.

If you desire further assistance with making decisions, be sure to read my other articles Why It’s So Hard to Make Decisions and How to Make Confident Decisions.

Think of "starting a business" in a less anxiety-producing way. Starting a business can feel daunting and overwhelming, especially when you already feel upset about the current unhappy state of your work life. I invite you to make a small tweak in your thinking.

Instead of putting all that pressure on yourself to start a business in order to get out of your current job, do this instead:

• First, shift your mindset around your current job. Yeah you can. Read How to Not Hate Your Job for a simple first step to transform negative work vibes. I will share additional steps in future articles and posts so be sure to follow me on LinkedIn, if you're not already.

As you shift your perspective about your job into one of empowerment, the urgency you feel about leaving will decrease. Less anxiety means you'll have more vitality to create your new endeavor.

• Second, think of starting a business as a practice in experimentation, especially if you're a first-timer. You're just exploring the growth of an idea. Do you feel the difference? For me, exploration is less pressured than having to start a new business from scratch. Sometimes a tweak in semantics is all you need to move forward.

The first interest I explored, prior to creating Feel Good Kick Ass, was developing my written and spoken voice as a mindset coach. I produced weekly episodes for a mindset blogcast every single week for 11 months straight.

The next interest was introducing life coaching components in the dance/fitness classes I was already teaching.

After that, I explored renting a yoga studio and starting a meetup group to facilitate what became the Rock Your Life Danceshops™.

Somewhere in there I also explored working with one-on-one clients privately. And so on.

For you, explore one thing then the next. Include a few free clients to boost your confidence. Then work your way up from there.
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To sum it up:

1. Take a pass at combining your interests into one idea.
2. If you can’t combine them, ask a neutral third party for input.
3. When all else fails, just pick one, knowing that you could thrive at any of them.
4. Stay in the energy of exploration and experimentation, or what I like to call explorimentation.

The only way to get it wrong is by not doing anything. You’ve got this.

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I work with clients for 9 months to 1 year as the most impactful thing you can do to catapult your career fulfillment while feeling good about yourself. If you're ready to propel forward, stop dipping your toe in the water. Just jump in. Complete this questionnaire or send me a message and we’ll book your complimentary powerful coaching conversation.

"Oh, you're just a [glorified] secretary." A co-worker once said this to me when I was as an administrative professional. Now, that comment hurt.

Part of it was my immediate reaction to the outdated and sexist overtone of this person's opinion. The other part of it was the very real internal conflict I experienced in having a profession that didn't match the way I viewed myself on the inside. I also had a profession that was out of alignment with the  work I wanted to be doing in the world.

I saw myself as an intelligent, confident, talented, capable, creative Ivy League graduate who happened to have this admin job as I worked to create my parallel careers in life coaching and dance/entertainment.  I didn't necessarily want to be working in admin, but there I was. So I chose to make it work.

First, there's nothing wrong with having any kind of job title - as long as you want that job and it works for you, just as much as you work for it. But if it's not working, if you still feel unseen and overlooked, then we've got a problem. Maybe one time the name wasn't a big deal, but now it's really bothering you. You feel that you can, and do, bring so much more to the table than this one- or two-word label captures.   

My fellow professional, you're experiencing cognitive dissonance. It's when you have conflicting beliefs about yourself. On the one hand you have this job title and to some degree you agree that you are this title.  On the other hand, you're absolutely not that job title. You believe you are something else. And you want to live into this something else more and more. Hello internal conflict!

(Sidenote: Here's a quick way to tell how you really feel about your job title. When you think of the name, do you experience pride or shame? Do you slump your shoulders and frown or do you lift your head as if wearing a crown?) 

But it's just a name. What's the big deal? You are not your job. This shouldn't matter, right?

Forget should or shouldn't. This is about what does or doesn't affect you.
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It matters because this boils down to identity. You spend so much time in your job, doing the roles of that job. So even if you don't consciously take on the identity of that job name, you are, in fact, adopting that job as part of your identity. It also matters because how you and others view you may adversely impact your job performance.

I think this experience might be more common than people admit or acknowledge. I went through my fair share of this, until I decided who I was, who I wanted to be, and showed up in that way. Eventually my job title changed to match this decisive version of me. In fact, my internal conflict and cognitive dissonance dissipated before the original job label did. And it can for you too.

Know this: You're not alone.

Know this: You can dramatically alter your experience without anything on the outside changing first. Here's how.

Write down every task, responsibility, and way of being that goes above and beyond the job description you were originally hired for. Write down every way in which you are proud of how you show up, e.g. You proactively present three solutions for every problem you bring to your boss.
Write down every accolade a colleague has shared with you. Acknowledge everything.

Reflect on the inventories you've written. Marinate in the proud, accomplished, and successful feelings that emerge. THIS is your identity. Bring this essence with you to work everyday. Let this energy fuel your daily actions. It soon becomes crystal clear that you've outgrown the original job title.

Do you know what time it is now?

Time to request your promotion! 

The internal conflict you experienced before was just growing pains. You couldn't articulate it then, but you just needed to shed some old skin. As you fed and nourished yourself with your preferred identity, your self-perception grew. And now you're ready to wear the skin, to wear the clothing, that actually fits.

I went through this process of filling myself up first, of bringing my best self to the table and the  natural next step was to get a promotion. I created a case for it. I presented it to my manager. They initially said, "I'll take this into consideration." I followed up. I was told, "Not yet." I kept following up. I kept showing up above and beyond that official job title. Then my manager said, "Yes, and I've got something better for you." My new job title was a step up from the one I asked for and my new compensation rate was higher than I had requested.

Decide who you are. Be that. The job title will follow.

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Do you show up to your desk everyday thinking about how much you don’t like your job, worried that you’re not making the impact you want to make with your gifts and talents? This is what I help clients with. I help professionals take control of their work life and feel confident about the direction their career is going while experiencing fantastic health and great relationships. I’m going to help you figure out how to view your job and career through the lens of possibility and opportunity instead of dread and disappointment. Book a call with me. 

What do you when you feel like your job is a hindrance to, rather than an expression of, living the life you want? In this video, I discuss the difference between having a job vs. having a career. I also share a simple sentence you can start using immediately that will help you transform your lackluster job situation into an experience of purpose, connection, and power.
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