To Get Ahead, Look Within

“Treat yourself as you are, and you will remain as you are. Treat yourself as you could be, and you will become what you should be.”

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

I love Emerson, and I often need to remind myself that I should treat “me” well. That includes enlarging my ideas about my personal possibilities, dreaming of the future, and taking steps to attain my goals. November was “National Career Development Month.” In retrospect, I have to admit that I have not run across many people that were content with their career status. Very few lacked a certain desire to improve their professional position.

For those that want to ascend the professional ladder, the question becomes how do we make self-improvement a more pressing matter? How can we focus more on our own development? Some experts might say that we can use our current organizations as vehicles for this advancement. They say that our organizations should engage us to cultivate our strengths, which will further drive our desires to improve our skills and performance. This is not totally wrong. Having said that, let’s not rely on our employers to engage us. According to the State of the Global Workplace 2021 report (done by Gallup), only 20% of employees felt engaged in 2020. That stat leaves little wonder as to why we have seen what Professor Anthony Klotz termed the “Great Resignation.”

Sound psychologic practice tells us that the desire to upskill our personal “tool-box” has a lot to do with finding solid ways that we can engage the parts of our brains that are responsible for future-planning and drive. Not only do we have to engage this desire, but it must also be done at the right time. This is not a one size fits all endeavor. What motivates me might not motivate you. Two brilliant psychiatrists at Columbia University (Eleanor H. Simpson & Peter D. Balsam) found that motivation is “a function of both internal states as well as external environmental conditions.” What they mean, in layman’s terms, is that motivation is actually driven at a molecular level, as well as a situational level. Our motivation for certain things is biologically ingrained within us, and the good news is that we can nurture that part of us. Fascinating.

What does it look like to nurture motivation? For me, this brings to mind the Paralympic athlete Tatyana McFadden. Tatyana was born in Russia with spina bifida and paralyzed from the waist down. She was abandoned at an orphanage where, sadly, the financial constraints did not allow her to have a wheelchair. Until age six, she walked with her hands. After being adopted by an American, Deborah McFadden, they relocated to the United States and Tatyana went to work. She overcame the physical challenges to play a number of sports and, through energized perseverance and real dedication, gained tremendous upper body strength. Ultimately, Tatyana became the youngest Paralympian in 2004, and in 2013 she won SIX gold medals as a wheelchair racer. I am in awe when I think of this story and the work that Tatyana put into her success and development.

There is no time like the present to begin this journey of who we could be. It takes perseverance, emotional intelligence, honesty, and SMART goals (specific, measurable, relevant, and time-based). Career development is our responsibility, and we must take action to nurture the motivation that resides in us naturally. Shakespeare wrote, “It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.” Nurture your motivation, follow that dream, and watch your professional evolution take shape!