Careers and Depression

 

Careers and Depression

The bag and baggage

To choose a career, to pursue a career, to change a career, or to end a career—they often come with the bag and baggage of the signs and symptoms of depression, such as fear, regret, disappointment, and among others.

Career choice

A case in point

A Chinese couple in North America have a son who wants to pursue a career in the entertainment industry. Their son in his early thirties decided to go to Beijing to learn the Chinese language as a prerequisite of his career pursuit. His parents have opposed to the idea of living in Beijing, or rather pursuing a career in the entertainment industry.

The different perspectives

From the parents’ perspectives: a really successful career in the entertainment industry is few and far between, especially if it is not pursued at a much younger age.

From the son’s perspectives: money, glamour, and quick recognition often come with success in a career in the entertainment industry.

The ultimate truths

A be-all-and-end-all career based on only one variable, which is money, may not turn out that way.

Any glamorous career is always competitive, but it does not mean it is unachievable at any age. Have an empty mind that everything is doable and achievable irrespective of the age.

Recognition should not be the only primary reason for pursuing any career; rather, passion should be the driving force behind.

Easy success in any human endeavor hurts ultimately,  especially a career in the long term, because it does not expand an individual’s capacity and capability to deal with problems when they get tough, or to have the persistence to go through them when things do not turn out as expected. Hard-earned success, on the other hand, may prepare an individual for more success in the future through persistence and perseverance. 

The reality

There is no right or wrong in the choice or pursuit of your career; after all, it is your career, and others may be looking at your career from their own perspectives.

Follow your passion, not people or what they say. Success comes from hard work, and not from wishful thinking. Spend your internal energy pursuing what you want, not defending or explaining why you want it; the latter has to do with your ego. Always ask yourself many self-intuitive questions about why and how you want to pursue your career goals.

TAO wisdom

According to TAO, choosing a career is like digging a well. Did you choose the right spot? Have you dug deep enough? If nothing happens according to your expectation, then self-doubt, reinforced by fear and uncertainty, may make you go for another spot. Going for another spot and yet another one may only bring you further frustration and more disappointment.

The bottom line: carefully choose your career, apply persistent effort, and you will find your initial investment of time and effort rewarding. Even if you choose to move on after a while, you will still find it very worthwhile because you have learned something from it Just remember that giving up is not an admission of defeat or disappointment; rather, giving up is letting go of any resistance when dealing with the chaos of life, and redirecting your energy to a higher purpose.

“The Way to the Creator is deep-rooted.

Unmoved, it becomes the source of all movement.

Stable, it enables us to act without rashness.

“So, whatever we do, we do not abandon our true nature.

The world around us is riddled with worries and distractions.

We remain stable, steady, and steadfast.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 26)

Do not abandon your true nature: be stable, steady, and steadfast.

Career advancement

Career advancement involves many new challenges and increasing responsibilities. If this is what you want, it may provide you with satisfaction and motivation to move on with your current career.

On the other hand, if career advancement is not right for you, then you may consider lateral move within your organization, that is, changing your daily duties but without increasing your responsibilities.

TAO wisdom

Wanting or not wanting your career advancement is your choice. According to TAO, your choice should not be based on control or power.

“Likewise, our greatness comes

not from our power or control,

but from our own true nature,

which is living as one with the Creator.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 34)

During career advancement, your procrastination may sometimes become an obstacle, causing frustration. Lao Tzu said: “A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.”

“Great accomplishments are only

a combination of small steps.

Difficult tasks are no more than

a series of easy steps.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 63)

So, begin your first step, and one step at a time, but do not overstep yourself.

“Striving to climb the ladder of success,

we may seem smart.

But trusting our Creator,

we find divine guidance,

which is effortless along the Way.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 28)

Climbing a career ladder successfully is never easy and smooth: involvement with argument and aggression is often inevitable. Ambition often comes with an aggressive and domineering personality, often leading to coercion and imposition.

According to TAO, do what you have to do, but without “over-doing” it, which essentially means acting without attachments or expectations, but with effortless efficiency. While climbing your career ladder, neither push someone over nor use any inappropriate means to remove any obstacle that may stand in your way. Career success stems from your contentment, and not your resentment

“Resentment breeds more resentment.

Only contentment leads to contentment.

True contentment comes from our true nature:

not from what we do, or how we do;

neither from our status nor our control.

The Creator is impartial.

No one is special.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 79)

In your career advancement, you may find the urge to argue to prove that you are right

“The wise learn to succumb, instead of arguing.”

(Tao Te Ching, Chapter 81)

Arguing with your co-workers or just anyone else can never bring any worthwhile benefits. When you feel the urge to argue a point with someone, take a deep breath, bite your tongue, and remind yourself that any combat is due to your own ego.

Countering any aggression with aggression is just like fighting fire with fire. According to TAO, when confronted with aggression, neither fight back nor back down; instead be gentle but firm. The objective is not to humiliate the aggressor but to transform the harm into harmony, and the aggression into peace.

“So, we advance

not at the expense of overstepping anyone.

So, we gain

not at the expense of making anyone lose.

So, we accomplish

not at the expense of straining ourselves.

We have no enemy.

We love everyone as ourselves.

We remain in our true nature;

otherwise, we lose

the three essentials of the Way,

and become our own enemy.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 69)

On the other hand, if you find that you have assumed an aggressive and domineering personality during your career advancement, do remind yourself the wisdom of not expanding your ego at the expense of others, because career success, like anything else, can never sustain itself over the long haul. The reality is that nothing lasts, not even a very successful career.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Your Career and Your Marriage

Your career may play a pivotal role in the success of your marriage.

If you want to start a business career, you must have your own innovative ideas that make you “think out of the box.” To turn your business into success, you must demonstrate your passion, your motivation, and your perseverance. Starting a business also requires some cash too, as Warren Buffett once said: “Cash is to a business as oxygen is to an individual.”

So, do you have what-it-takes to become successful in your business career?

Pursuing a business or professional career has many setbacks that an individual must be prepared to confront—just like a marriage couple will have to face many challenges along their marriage journey.

Growing up into adolescents and young adults, many may begin to have their own dreams, goals, and passions for what they’re going to do with their own lives. To many, growing up is apparently all about success and failure—that also, paradoxically, defines the meaning of life for them, including the meaning of marriage. In other words, their success in marriage is contingent on their own success in their career pursuits.

The reality is that a very successful career doesn’t guarantee a good marriage; as a matter of fact, the reverse is often true.

The successful

A successful career takes up much of your time. That means you’ll be spending less time with your marriage partner and your family. Are you prepared to do that? Which is more important to you: your career or your marriage? Are you always time-stressed?

Career success is also instrumental in increasing one’s ego—making one more self-centered, more controlling, and more demanding. An inflated ego may adversely affect marital relationship in many ways.

So, always seek balance and harmony between career and marriage, if both are important to you.

The less successful

To pursue a successful career, you must be motivated, persevering, and not comparing with others.

The reality is that many pursue their careers with many setbacks, falling short of their high expectations. That often leads to depression, which may affect their marital relationships. In addition, it‘s not uncommon that many also tend to compare their own accomplishments with those of others—leading to the sin of envy, or their feeling of the need to do much more to enhance their success. The sin of envy is often the source of seeking control, power, or even “illegal” means to guarantee their anticipated future success.

The unsuccessful

Many pursue their careers with little or no success at all, always experiencing intermittent employment or unemployment. But that’s the reality of life.

The unsuccessful may originate from the sin of sloth—not doing what they’re supposed to be doing. They may feel low self-esteem, isolation, and separation from others. To them, life has little or no meaning, so they just drift in and out every day without a purpose—that may also adversely affect their marital relationships. Worse, some may even become vulnerable to committing crimes and violence with no accountability.

The good news is that some can still transform themselves, turning their failures into successes.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

“GETTING MARRIED TO MAKE YOU HAPPY?”

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Money and Marriage

 If money really matters to you, then earn more.

To earn more, capitalize on the skills you already have, enhance and improve them, and look for better and richer employment. In addition, there are likely many other skills you may possess that cannot be or have not been fully maximized or utilized wherever you are working. Then, harness those skills and capitalize on them through doing some freelance work on the side to maximize your current income.

If, on the other hand, you do not have the basic skills, and you do not want to learn and acquire them, and yet you always crave money and wealth, then your cravings are only your money fantasies.

What are money fantasies?

Only your money wisdom can separate your money fantasies from the money realities.

There was the story of a beautiful and sophisticated woman in her mid-twenties who wrote to an investment counseling company looking for a list of eligible bachelors with earnings of at least $600,000 a year. That woman had money fantasies in her mind.

According to experts, using marriage as an investment is a money fantasy, and no more than a bad investment bargain—just like investing into a shrinking currency. Imagine, the beauty of that woman will shrink over the years, while the $600,000 may grow over the long haul.

So, marrying into money, buying the lottery, and winning at the casino are all money fantasies.

What are money miseries?

Money miseries are also the realities for many, who always feel dissatisfied, frustrated, insecure, and insolvent. This mental condition suffered by many is often a result of constant exposure to media news of the rich and the famous, as well as their own perceptions of “possessions equal satisfaction.” It is your own mental interpretation of what you see verses who you really are.

You have money miseries if you have a job with a modest income but still living from paycheck to paycheck. If you are struggling with money miseries, you need your money wisdom to change your belief system, to stop comparing yourself with others around you, as well as to identify all the whys of your emotional feelings about and around your money miseries.

Why so many are broke?

According to The Wall Street Journal, many consumers (nearly 70 percent) are living from paycheck to paycheck. More than 50 percent consumers worry a lot about money, such as retirement. Once they lose their jobs or encounter any financial crisis, they become broke.

Even wealthy celebrities, such as Mike Tyson and Michael Jackson, go broke.

Mike Tyson, a boxing champion with several heavyweight titles, earning over $300 million dollars during his successful boxing career, ended up in bankruptcy in 2003.

Michael Jackson, recording artist, dancer, singer and songwriter, earning more than $500 million dollars, was heavily in debt when he died in 2009.

Of course, you might say: “If I had those millions of dollars, I wouldn’t become broke?” But if you cannot change your current spending habits, it would be a lot more difficult to change them when you have become a wealthy celebrity, such as Mike Tyson or Michael Jackson.

So, going broke is no respecter of persons, whether you are poor or rich.

The bottom line: Everyone needs to have the money wisdom to know how to earn, invest, and spend money to avoid going broke.

Click here to get your paperback, and click here to get your ebook.

NORA WISE

Copyright © Nora Wise

Living in Balance and Harmony

 The TAO of Living in Balance and Harmony

The mind needs balance and harmony both to control the body and to seek guidance from the soul, which supervises the mind.

Balance and harmony in the soul is alignment and connection for self-healing of the body.

Alignment and realignment

The body, the mind, and the soul work together as a system of life energy for healing. The free flow or stagnation of this life-giving energy is dependent on the balance and harmony of the body, the mind, and the soul at each and every moment. It is this moment-to-moment alignment in the body, the mind, and the soul, as well as their alignment with one another, that creates your unique state of self-healing and self-help, which is a miracle in itself.

What is your current state of self-healing and self-help?

If you are living your life as if nothing is a miracle, most probably your body, mind, and soul are in misalignment with one another. You might feel your body is not healing, your mind is strangled with sadness and doomed to despair, and you life has little or no meaning, without a goal or purpose. On the other hand, if your current state of being is one of joy, hope, and purpose, you are living as if everything is a miracle because your body, mind, and soul are not only inter-connected, but also in perfect balance and harmony with one another.

Alignment or realignment is inter-connection of the body, the mind, and the soul to achieve balance and harmony for self-healing and self-help.

The miracle of self-healing is manifested in the spiritual wisdom of the soul that guides and inspires the mind, which controls the body living in the physical world.

Connection and reconnection

According to entropy, one of the laws of physics, anything left to itself will ultimately disintegrate, and fall apart.

According to John Donne, the famous English poet, “no man is an island, and every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.”

Essentially, everything in the universe is somehow and somewhat connected, just as man is connected with one another in a subtle way. The miracle of this connection is to provide balance and harmony to guarantee their existence and co-existence, that is, their alignment with one another.

Focusing on others rather than just on yourself illuminates your soul to see its necessity to express your empathy, generosity, gratitude, and loving-kindness to others. But the challenge not to do that is as great as your innate desire to seek spirituality. Therefore, simplicity in living may enhance your spirituality and increase your strength to overcome the challenge to seek spiritual wisdom.

With spiritual wisdom, you may believe in the miracle of self-healing. You will then see that all happenings in your life are somehow “connected” for an unfathomable and unimaginable purpose, and that you can turn any bad situation into an opportunity for self-healing and self-help. Believe in the miracle that you are connected with everyone you meet in your life, and that everyone can be either your teacher or your student. In other words, there is much for you to learn from any circumstance, as well as from one another. This is the miracle of alignment and connection.

The TAO

According to the TAO, not living in balance and harmony is not living for life:

“When there is abundance, there is lacking.

When there is craving, there is discontentment.

Striving for power to control and influence

every aspect of our lives

is the source of our suffering.

Obsessed with getting and keeping,

many of us never really live before we die.

Following the Way,

we must learn to let go.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 75)

Letting go is adapting and adjusting any imbalance and disharmony in your everyday life and living:

“Following the Way is like bending a bow:

one end is pulled up;

the other end is pulled down.

Excess and deficiency are balanced.

According to wisdom of the Way:

we reduce when there is excess;

we increase when there is deficiency.

Balance is thus created.

According to common wisdom:

we increase excess and deplete deficiency.

Imbalance is thus created.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 77)

But, given that there are too many attachments in life, letting go is not easy and it requires profound human wisdom:

“Stilling our thoughts,

our needs become few.

Following our thoughts,

our distractions become more,

and thus living in chaos.

Enlightenment is our true nature.

Meditation helps us find the origin,

and thus ending our suffering.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 52)

Attachments to the world are only distractions that lead to detours, causing imbalance and disharmony along the journey:

“The Way is easy,

yet people prefer distracting detours.

Beware when things are out of balance.

Remain centered within the Creator.

                

Distractions are many,

in the form of riches and luxuries.

They allure us from the Way.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 53)

No-stress living is the way to attaining balance and harmony:

“So, we no longer argue with those who are cynical.

We stop looking for their approval.

We cease taking offense at their unbelief.

We just sow the seeds along the Way,

letting the Creator reap the harvest.

To be loved or rejected,

to gain or to lose,

to be approved or disapproved,

no longer matters to us,

when we know who we are

and who the Creator is.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 56)

According to the TAO, living in balance and harmony is all about “spontaneity" which is the understanding of the nature of all things.  

According to the TAO, spontaneity is “doing without over-doing”—which essentially means “doing without consciously anticipating the outcome.”

In the universe, there is an all-controlling force that monitors everything. You breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide. You eat and you eliminate. You grow, mature, and die. Spontaneity is the natural built-in mechanism in each living organism. Spontaneity creates balance and harmony, expressed in the Yin and the Yang (the female and the male). Spontaneity is the ultimate understanding of the natural cycle of all things that are beyond human control: what goes up must also come down; success is followed by failure; life forever begets death:

“The Creator creates one.

One creates two.

Two creates three.

Three creates a myriad of things.

All have their original unity

in the duality of the Yin and the Yang,

the opposite life forces that harmonize.

We experience this harmonious process

in the rising and falling of our breaths.

People naturally avoid loss and seek gain.

But with all things along the Way,

there is no need to pick and choose.

There is no gain without loss.

There is no abundance without lack.

We do not know how and when

one gives way to the other.

So, we just remain in the center of things,

trusting the Creator, instead of ourselves.

This is the essence of the Way.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 42)

With spontaneity, we become babies again, living in perfect balance and harmony with everyone and everything:

“If we are in harmony with the Creator,

we are like newborn babies,

in natural harmony with all.

Our bones are soft, and our muscles are weak,

but our grip is strong and powerful.

Not knowing about sex,

we manifest sexual arousal.

Crying all day long,

we lose not our voice.

With constancy and harmony,

we accomplish all daily tasks

without growing tired.

                        

In natural harmony with the Creator,

we let all things come and go,

exerting no effort, showing no desire,

and expecting no result.

Natural harmony is experienced

only in the present moment,

when we see the natural laws of the Creator.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 55)

According to the TAO, living in the present moment is living in balance and harmony:

“We act without over-action.

We manage without interference.

We enjoy without attachment.

Effrontery is just

an opportunity for loving-kindness.

Great accomplishments are only

a combination of small steps.

Difficult tasks are no more than

a series of easy steps.

Therefore, we focus on the present moment,

doing what needs to be done,

without straining and stressing.

To end our suffering,

we focus on the present moment,

instead of our expected result.

So, we follow the natural laws of things.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 63)

Most importantly, spontaneity shows us the wisdom of the impermanence of all things—that is, nothing lasts despite all human efforts to make them continue:

“Strong winds come and go.

So do torrential rains.

Even heaven and earth cannot make them last forever.”

(Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 23)

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau