Alexis 0:05

Hey , I'm Alexis Booth and welcome to the Breakout Booth . I was a senior manager at Google . I'm a wife and a mother , and I learned the hard way If you're not fired up , you're on hold . I believe success is closer than you think . There's a set of skills and habits you can grow to unlock unbelievable outcomes . In this podcast , we'll explore them through real talk and bold conversation , because I want to help you break out .

Alexis 0:38

Hey there , folks , and welcome to the Breakout Booth ! I am Alexis Booth and I am so excited about today's discussion , which is focused on how to get unstuck . If you are feeling aimless or overwhelmed with life, or Or maybe you're feeling torn because you're working at a job where you feel like the work you're doing or the way your days are structured don't mesh with the way you feel like you want or need in your life . Or maybe you're feeling stuck in your personal life don't mesh with the way you feel like you want or need in your life . Or maybe you're feeling stuck in your personal life , whether it's with family relationships or your partner , or you want a partner , but that hasn't worked out for you yet . Whatever it is , if you are feeling stuck , this is a conversation for you , and I am so delighted to welcome someone into the booth today who I think is going to shed some incredible wisdom and inspiration for you . I can say it because every time I have the chance to speak with her , she does that very thing for me .

Alexis 1:35

Welcome to the Breakout Booth, Blessing Nnachi . I am so glad to have you here .

Blessing 1:41

Hello , I am delighted to be here and I just . . . your excitement is so contagious , I can't stop smiling .

Alexis 1:49

Well , your smile is making me smile .

Alexis 1:53

Well , please get yourself cozy over there in the booth . I hope that it's nice and comfortable . Question to start us off . Y ou've been working in customer facing roles for most of your career, I think . In more recent years you have been doing a lot more career coaching . What do you normally say to a new customer , a new team member or a new coaching client to help them get comfortable when they're talking with you ?

Blessing 2:17

Usually it's some off-color joke , something about the weather , because I'm Canadian and we love to talk about the weather . It's usually something to elicit a smile or a chuckle , like I just did . Mostly , it's more about how I show up rather than what I say . I try to be present and engaged and communicate with my body and my face that I want to be there and I don't want to be anywhere else and I'm not distracted , and that has a way of putting people at ease , I think

Some amazingly terrible jokes to start us off

Blessing 2:46

.

Alexis 2:46

Well , on the topic of jokes , we can throw a few out there to get us started . Do you know how to weigh a millennial ?

Blessing 2:54

No idea .

Alexis 2:56

It's an Instagrams . And why is a computer so smart ?

Blessing 3:03

No idea .

Alexis 3:04

It listens to its motherboard ! Oh , so good so bad .

Blessing 3:10

Those are classic I'm going to reuse those .

Alexis 3:12

And when does a joke become a mom joke ? When it becomes a parent . Okay , these are terrible , terrible jokes . We may even cut them out of the episode , but you know good way to get us smiling and laughing to start .

Blessing 3:27

This is awesome .

Alexis 3:28

So today we are going to be digging into the topic of how to get unstuck together , and there's so many things that I'm really excited to have you share with us and tell us about . But before we dig into that ,

Blessing Nnachi: welcome and background

Alexis 3:42

can you share a little bit more with our listeners about who you are and how you are filling your cup these days ?

Blessing 3:49

Sure , hi everyone . I am Blessing . I am a mom . It's one of the biggest parts of my identity . I'm a deeply family and community oriented person . I work at Google . I currently lead a team of program managers for our North region or sub region . I've always been in tech . I always knew I was going to be in tech . I don't particularly like calling myself a woman in tech , though there's a whole story behind that , but I work in the tech industry and I have since I graduated college . How I'm filling my cup these days is really spending time doing things I love , and it changes . But sometimes that looks like going into the gym , sometimes that looks like binge watching . The current show I'm watching is Wheel of Time .

Alexis 4:42

I have not checked this one out yet .

Blessing 4:44

Yeah , but really just asking myself what does my body need right now and doing that unapologetically . So I'm feeling really good . But you know there's many facets to who I am . Those are the big ones .

Alexis 4:59

Well , I love all of that . Thank you . There's a number of reasons that I asked you to be here today . Probably the most important one is that every time that I get to talk to you , you teach me something , and whether it's about something in the world at large that I didn't know about before , or oftentimes it's you dropping some profound nugget of wisdom and suddenly I realize something about myself that I'd never thought about , and it makes me stop and think about my life . I get so much out of every conversation that we have and I'm excited to share our chat with our listeners .

Alexis 5:35

But beyond just that and the conversations that we have , you just published a book . It is a beautiful and wonderful book . I devoured it in two days , just a couple weeks ago , and that is saying something , because my life right now is very busy , but I literally I could not put this book down , and the book was really the driver of wanting to have this conversation today , specifically about this idea of getting unstuck , because what you lay out in the book is really a practical and proactive way to go about doing it . I'm so thankful to have you here today , I'm so thankful that you're taking your time to be here , and unless there's anything else we want to talk about up top , I would say let's just jump into some juicy questions that sound good , sure let's do it .

Blessing 6:20

Yeah , I do want to say thank you for the invitation and I enjoy all of our conversations . We've known ourselves for several years at this point and we always found a way to just stay connected and I've really valued our relationship . Thank you .

Alexis 6:35

Yes , we're virtual for the listeners who can't see us right now , but I wish we could have started off with a hug . But here's like virtual . Yeah Well , thank you so much for saying that and the feeling is mutual , all right . Well , let's start off with a question , really to lay the groundwork today . In the past few years , you became a coach and you've written this new book it is called by Design . In addition to also still maintaining full-time employment at Google , which is a lot , let's start off our discussion exploring some of the backstory around all of this . What led you to do this work , especially around the coaching in the book , and what has your experience been as you've gone through

How Blessing’s book, “By Design,” came to life

Alexis 7:22

it ?

Blessing 7:22

The idea for the book came up from a desire to be more effective and efficient . I feel a sense of scarcity when I think about time and I was getting , you know , three , four years ago , a lot of requests Blessing , can you mentor me ? Blessing , can I pick your brain ? Pet peeve about that phrase . And you know I was thinking there has to be a way I can write some of these things down and direct people to somewhere . Everything doesn't have to be a conversation . And so the very first iteration of this was a playbook . It was maybe 10 pages long . It had a couple of , you know , thoughts and ideas about a number of the questions I was getting at the time , which was about career growth , it was about work-life balance , it was about navigating leadership teams , it was about navigating change and disruption , and so I penned a few of my ideas and I shared them with my then 24 person team , so really small team . I was like hey guys , I created this playbook for your career . You know , feel free to use it , feel free to share , no pressure . That got shared quite a bit and other people started reaching out . I got some feedback and I thought , oh , this is interesting , I could expand it , I could make it more robust . Around

Blessing 8:37

. the same time , I got assigned my first executive coach and I fell in love with coaching as a support modality . You know , coaching is so wonderful because it's not mentoring and it's not therapy , and it really really is built on this idea that the coachee is capable , able to navigate themselves out of whatever it is that they're dealing with . And that really resonated with me , because in mentoring there's a bit of show me how you did it , which is great but doesn't always fit because I'm a different person from you . Anyway , long story short , the book evolved over several drafts to became a love letter to my past self , because a lot of the issues that I addressed were things that I had to struggle with in the past and I didn't have access to either a coach or a mentor for several reasons .

Blessing 9:28

he then it also kind of became targeted at anyone who is like me or who has struggled with some of the things that I've struggled with . And so it's . It's designed to be very practical , very relatable , very usable . I don't want academic stories , I don't want a ton of you know , just you know vague ideas and practical things that you can take away and experiment with . So that's where we sort of landed and that's why the book is called by Design . But then I kind of follow it up with it's a guide . Obviously , a guide is a map and you can definitely veer off the course , but you know it's something to help you get started .

Alexis 10:06

I love that and I think there's a lot of similarities for me personally that I hear in terms of my own journey that I've been on .

Alexis 10:14

You know , one of the most meaningful things that I've had the opportunity to do in my career and in my life is coaching and mentoring . Is coaching and mentoring I get so much out of it . But it's also the storytelling and breaking down walls and sharing what is oftentimes really messy reality of what it takes to get from one place to the next , whether it's in your career or in the rest of your life . But I love that you pulled all of this together . There's also some just wonderful stories that you've sprinkled throughout the book that keep it so engaging and wonderful and , like I've been saying throughout this conversation , I also just deeply appreciate all of the advice that you've given me over the years . So I know that it's valuable and I just think so many other people will as well .

The story behind the book’s title

Alexis 11:07

Digging in a little bit more you talked about how you came up with the title of the book By Design . Can you talk about that a little bit more and sort of how that one came together ?

Blessing 11:17

So the title "By Design is actually inspired by a painting that I bought a few years ago . We moved into our current house just well four years ago this year and we were shopping for kind of like paintings and artwork for our walls and I was shopping for things for my home office and it's . I'm looking up because it's right in front of me and I saw this little painting . It's simple , it was gold lettering on white parchment paper with like gold borders , and it's it reads she designed a life she loved in the past tense .

Alexis 11:49

Oh , I love it !

Blessing 11:50

I know . And I was like I saw this and I'm like I have to have this and I have to read this every day . So it's right above my monitor .

Alexis 11:58

Oh , so you see this every single day , when you're in your office .

Blessing 12:00

Every single day . Yes , and again, this was about four years ago . This was happening around the same time that I wrote the playbook . This was happening around the same time I had just started working with the coach and so it was kind of like a seed in my mind . I love the fact that it says she . It says designed in the past tense and loved in the past tense , and so it really started me thinking about intentionality and looking backwards and kind of sitting with the feeling of am I happy with the way yesterday went ? And last week and last month and last year .

Blessing 12:36

And if I'm not , how do I make today go better , or tomorrow , or next week , or next year ?

Blessing 12:41

And so it's just like every day , I sit at the end of my day and I look up and I go . Today was a good day . This is a day that I've loved when I started thinking about a title for the book . We workshopped a few titles but the word design kept coming back . And how you know , when you're explaining something and you say in the text space , you're like it's a feature , not a bug . That was one of the phrases I played with . You know , like , oh , you don't understand why I'm doing that . It is on purpose . Like I am doing that on purpose , and that's sort of how we got to By Design . I love that .

Alexis 13:12

That is so beautiful . Is this also - there's on Instagram, you have a lot of posts . Is that also an inspiration from this artwork ?

Blessing 13:20

Yes , yes .

Alexis 13:22

Okay , it's helping me actually visualize what I think you're showing . For me , you know, so I read your book and it's very funny . I knew that I wanted to bring you on the podcast . I was like I remember thinking to myself oh , what's the conversation that we should be having together ? I don't know what we should call this . I could have gone back and looked at the cover of the book . I had not focused on the name of the book because I wanted to read your book and I was just focusing on reading your book anyway , so the title actually was not even a thing I was thinking about

How to recognize you’re feeling "stuck"

Alexis 13:57

, but the phrase that kept on coming back to me was how to get unstuck , the reason that I had that and why for the podcast . That's what we're calling it . It's because that's the feeling that I have had in the moments when I knew I needed a change and when I think about design . That's like the practical step that you take , but it starts with the recognition and , to be honest , the realization that I was stuck is something that can actually be really hard to notice , and I want to go off on a little bit of a tangent here , but I hope you will indulge me .

Alexis 14:30

There is a great quote that I came across a few months ago . It's credited to a man named George Gurdjieff - I probably just butchered that . I'm terrible at names . He was a spiritual leader from the early 1900s . His work is still studied today , but anyway , it started off with a question that he supposedly posed to his students , and it was if a prisoner desires to be freed from prison , what is the first thing that the prisoner needs to know ? And the answer doesn't have anything to do with guards , the building , even the keys or the locks . The prisoner needs to know that they are in prison .

Blessing 15:09

Oh . . .

Alexis 15:10

what have to start with .

Blessing 15:11

That is profound .

Alexis 15:12

Yeah ! So , going back through my own past , the times where I have felt stuck can generally be summed up as I felt like I was being caught up in all the demands of life . I was obligated to carry on with my day-to-day of my current situation because I needed to pay the bills . Really , arguably , that's the main thing that it has been driving me for most of it . There's other reasons too . There's relationships or other things that are already established and set in their ways , and that's what it is , and so I wasn't in a prison cell , but it's like I was in a prison in my mind . So maybe , if you're listening in here , maybe you have kids or you have a dog , or you have an ailing parent that you need to take care of , or maybe you just got to cover the rent and put food on the table and take care of yourself . It can feel like a lot , and sometimes it can feel like it's too much . You know , I also admit there's plenty of times that I didn't realize I was actually stuck .

Alexis 16:14

kind of a complicated idea , but I might have noticed some other things if I paid attention to them . Like , I was feeling restless , I was feeling depleted or dissatisfied . Another one is I was feeling resentment toward other people , whether it's a friend or a coworker or even my husband . He has been the recipient of a lot of these things . Sorry , jeff Geoff Yeah , they're sharing exciting stories and things that they're so proud of and they want to celebrate , and meanwhile I'm sitting here like sitting in this feeling of just unhappiness . I'm feeling like mad , I'm in despair . It's so unfair . Like why do they get that Like , ah , everything I'm doing is so hard . Another one I've had before is getting the ick , especially relevant to like romantic relationships , but I've also had it toward co-workers or even work situations . You know that one is more of a feeling of disgust , a repulsion about something .

Alexis 17:20

I know I'm spending a lot of time here talking about feelings and emotions , but I'm intentionally doing it for our listeners , because I actually think one of the things that can be most difficult about getting unstuck is realizing that you're stuck in the first place .

Blessing 17:37

Yeah .

Alexis 17:37

So I think that's a really good place to start , and I also do want to call out . I didn't actually find this quote all by myself , and I also do want to call out I didn't actually find this quote all by myself . It was actually something I found in a talk that I came across fairly recently by Elle Luna . She told this beautiful and inspiring story in a video that I'm going to share in the show notes , which is an exploration of a book she wrote called t"he Crossroads of Should and Must . It is absolutely worth a watch . She's an artist , she's just this beautiful storyteller and it is absolutely gorgeous . Anyway , just to be clear , I love your book by Design is a great title . I'm not trying to suggest that you should have named it anything else , and especially it sounds like that is just such a personal and profound story for you . But I did want to talk about how someone might even be coming to the realization that a book like yours is worth spending the time with because you're actually feeling stuck in there .

Alexis 18:39

There are signals that , if you pay attention to them , that you might pick up on like maybe it's time for me to really think about what . What's going on ?

Blessing 18:48

There's so many really interesting things that you've said and you know we don't have the time to dig into every single one of them . However , when you talked about feeling the ick , I really you know it's kind of you're going into a meeting and your heart is racing and your palms are sweaty , but it's a super simple meeting really and you you kind of sometimes don't pause to say why am I so agitated ? Is it your personality on the customer side or personality on my team or cross-functional team that is making me really anxious .

Blessing 19:22

Funny story I had a certain person on my team who every time I met with them and they left , I sighed and I didn't know I was doing that , and then we'd kind of the meeting would enter and I would do like you know , when you've been holding your breath . And it was a coworker who pointed it out and said I've noticed that whenever this person leaves the room , you sigh and I thought , oh , I'm . So . You know , I kind of feel like I'm . You know , I hold myself together almost in a defensive posture and when they leave I can let my guard down , and so it's kind of paying attention to those signals and it's really important . I think feelings are important signals . We shouldn't over fixate on them , but we should absolutely pay attention to what they're trying to communicate to us .

Blessing 20:05

And you're right , the title of the book is "by design . But to answer your question about who should be who's this book for ? Who should be looking to read this book ?

Blessing 20:15

I think that, you know, know .

Blessing 20:17

I was reading some research I think it was by Adam Grant , and he talked about how the contract between employees and employers have changed in the last , you know , five decades . In the 60s and 70s and 80s . You , you know , started a job in your 20s and there was a an expectation that you stayed at that job for 40 years and you retired and you got a nice relax and a nice party and then you kind of went into retirement and so a lot of people you know focused on getting that good job right out of you know , college or high school or whatever , and they just kind of stayed and rose through the ranks . That was the contract . It was unwritten , it was unspoken but was expected .

Blessing 20:58

And then you fast forward to the early 2000s and that started to change and the loyalty between employers and employees started to shift and employees started to demand so much more from the employers , like I want you to pay me to do my job , but I also want you to care about the causes that I care about , and I also want you to be socially responsible and I also want you to do X , y and Z , and employers also started to demand more from employees . I want you to be available 24-7 . I want you to do X , y and Z , and employers also started to demand more from employees . I want you to be available 24-7 . I want you to have your phone on you at all times .

Alexis 21:30

I expect you to work on vacation . Well , some of this is the technology made it possible too . Exactly , you didn't physically leave the office and your paperwork was all there .

Blessing 21:38

Exactly right . You didn't come home with a briefcase , you came home with a cell phone and everything was on the cell phone . And so what that has led to is kind of like a question around but why ? Why should I give you an hour on my vacation ? Why is 40 hours a week not enough if that's what's in my contract ? And so this book is really for anyone who's questioning the why of it , the why of five-year plans and 10-year plans , the why of changing jobs every five to 10 years , the sense of what is the point of this . There's a sense of kind of like apathy almost in a lot of the conversations I'm having around . Okay , so I work for 30 years and I make a bunch of money , then what ? So if you've ever had any of those thoughts , then you should read the book .

Alexis 22:23

Yes , you should ! Well , so diving into a little bit of the book . So I've known you for . . . but I have to admit you grabbed my attention

Reflecting on Blessing’s story in the preface

Alexis 22:35

before your book even really started . In the preface there was this really profound story that you shared there . Can you talk a little bit about how you open up the book ?

Blessing 22:50

Oh , that's a good one . The story at the beginning of the book is actually one of the last things that I added to the book , so I didn't start the book with a story . I wrote the entire book and then I went back and I wrote the preface .

Blessing 23:05

At this time I already had , I think , an initial manuscript . I had shared a copy of it with my publisher and on one of our calls we're kind of talking about ideas and she said to me Blessing , tell me why you're writing this book . And it was a jarring question because it kind of pulled at some vulnerability that I was already feeling . And you know my initial thought was well , you're a publisher , this is a commercial transaction for you shouldn't care , right . But it was also . This was kind of two years into wrestling with the manuscript and wondering if anyone would care , why would anyone want to read it ? So it was a good question because it made me think . And so I started to think about why and who's this book for and why would anyone want to read it . So it was a good question because it made me think . And so I started to think about why and who's this book for . And the one thing that someone had said to me I was on a coaching session with a client and you know I asked a few questions and the individual said to me you know what , listen , this is easy for you . You work at this company and you live here and , almost like you have it made and I'm like that couldn't be farther from the truth . And you know , I know I don't have it made and , yes , I've had hardship .

Blessing 24:11

And so I started thinking about milestone events , and we we get a handful of those over the course of our lives and , um , I think of milestone events as events that shape us as humans , and so I really wanted to share with the readers the idea that sometimes we cannot control the cards we're dealt . I did not pick my parents , I did not pick the country I was born in , the color of my skin or even my gender . Right , I could not control the fact that my dad and my mom didn't get along and there was tension in their marriage . But I can decide how to respond , how I react and who I become , and I could totally blame , you know , turning out a certain way on my parents , and there are a lot of people who empathize with that . But that is the kind of the story behind the preface , without giving too much away .

Blessing 24:58

But it's a theme that recurs throughout the entire book . It's about thinking about what is within your span of control and directing your energies in that direction and that direction only . I can't control what people think of me . So I won't focus on that . I will focus on showing up . The way that I want to show up and the way that I think that I should , or the way that I think that I must , should and must is again another great conversation I would like to talk about . But it's really getting clear on what you want to put out in the world and leaving everything else , including perception , including expectations , including everything else . And then when someone says to you , hey , why don't you come out drinking anymore ? You say to them it's by design .

Alexis 25:52

So , by the way , that was an artful answer of this question of not actually giving the spoiler of truly the full story that the book starts out with . You'll need to listen to the book or you'll need to - well , actually , are you going to do an audiobook ?

Blessing 26:02

I haven't decided . I have thought about it .

Alexis 26:04

Well , for now , you'll have to read to get the full story . It is a really profound story that you start with , and there's plenty more profound stories in there . I love how open and vulnerable you were with it in the context of it , and I agree with you that sharing of all these stories - I mean it's very similar to what I'm doing on the podcast too . I am opening up about all sorts of things and challenges that I've gone through here and , as I'm finally bringing this to the world , it's scary of launching these and I imagine also putting that book out into the world felt scary to you and probably still feels scary .

Blessing 26:46

Oh , it does .

Alexis 26:49

It does , but it's beautiful and I'm so appreciative that you shared so many of those stories .

Alexis 26:58

Digging in a little bit more into the meat of

The “Good Life Triangle” - what it is, why it’s important

Alexis 27:01

the book . One of my favorite things in it is in chapter one . It is a you call it the good life triangle . Can you share a little bit more on what the triangle is and why you use that to start off the book ?

Blessing 27:17

Absolutely so . The good life triangle is a concept I borrow from a number of places . I'm currently leading a team of program managers and , for those that are familiar , the Project Management Institute , pmi . They have this idea of a project management triangle that has cost , budget and scope and project managers .

Alexis 27:39

That's the joke , and you can't have them all !

Blessing 27:42

No , you can't .

Blessing 27:44

And the whole point of the skill , the primary skill set of a project manager is managing the tension between all three and acknowledging that there's tension between all three in order to get to a successful outcome . And then , a little over a year ago , my pastor preached a sermon where he talked about the elements of a good life and he used a similar visual , and I thought this is great , and the reason why I love the good life triangle so much is when you say , well , what makes a good life ? There's so many subjective responses to that . Well , having enough money , taking care of your family , giving back , taking care of others , being charitable , you know . And there's many different responses , but I was thinking in terms of themes and categories and a lot of these responses can fit into any of these categories .

Blessing 28:34

And so the idea of a good life . I'll talk a little bit about it . It has three elements . It has freedom , community and meaning , and I use the triangle with permission from my pastor , and in that section of the book I talk about the inverse relationship between the three things . And so when you look at freedom , for example , freedom I define as being able to do anything , whenever , however , with whomever . So think about a life completely free of constraints , which is really hard to imagine for a lot of people .

Blessing 29:07

But if we could kind of envision a world with zero constraints . That would be like freedom at its peak . The direct invest of that is expectations , and with expectations come constraints . Well , but I have to take care of my kids , but I have to pay my mortgage .

Alexis 29:26

By the way , those expectations a lot of them are external , a whole lot of them are in my own brain . Absolutely , I have so many unfair expectations of myself . Oh my God .

Blessing 29:39

Absolutely , and that's the thing, right ? It is also the expectations we take on ourselves , the expectations we assume that other people have of us without talking to them , and you know , it's things like , you know , looking at someone and saying you know what , I think they expect me to do X and not having a clarifying conversation , and so , anyway , I talk about the inverse relationship between freedom , community and meaning , and when I talk about community , I talk about a lot about belonging , but also about intentionally picking what those communities are and the fact that in order to have community , you will have to sacrifice some freedom .

Alexis 30:22

It's like freedom is the price of community almost right , and it's , if you think about freedom as currency I'd never , I'd never thought about it that way before and it was so profound , as you , as I was reading that of , because because we're social beings and we , yeah , we are built , I mean like we're built to be social creatures um , but there's also , yeah , what ? What an interesting tension there . I'd never thought about that yeah and so like .

Blessing 30:51

So when you think about freedom and community , I talk about freedom being the price of community , and when , if you start to think about your freedom as currency , you then start to think about community as an investment . And so if I'm going to spend an hour with so-and-so or doing so-and-so , is it worth it ? You know what is the ROI ? Do I feel ? Do I get belonging back ? Do I get growth ? Do I get support ? What am I getting out of this community ? And then you take community and you talk about meaning is kind of so what's the point of it ? What is the point of that relationship ? And you know I'm extremely introverted , which makes me super picky about my social relationships . And I always say to my husband I'm like I feel like this relationship has a negative ROI on me and so I'm going to see this person less and is being able to say I'm going to invest less in this thing because it doesn't help me , it's not worth what I'm paying for it . And so when I talk about the elements of a good life , it's like holding the tension between those three things , because the successful outcome is what is the most important thing to you , what is the meaning and it's making those decisions wholeheartedly , unapologetically , because you will disappoint someone Once you start to do that . You will absolutely disappoint someone . You will disappoint several people , actually A lot of people , a lot of people .

Blessing 32:17

I'll give you an example from my life this week . You know , there's someone who wanted to spend time with me this week and I love her and she's great and I really do need to see her . But I had made a commitment to spend that evening with my husband and I forgot . I forgot that I said we're going to do something that evening and so I was making plans with this person and then they said to me you know , hey , we're still on for so and so . And I remembered that I had made a commitment and I said you know what ? I'm sorry , I'm not available that evening anymore . I know that means that I don't get to see for another three weeks because we're both busy . I do apologize , but I am going to prioritize doing this other thing . And I didn't . I didn't actually explain , I didn't say all of this . I just said I'm no longer available . I'll see you in three weeks . I can't control how they feel about that .

Alexis 33:03

They're probably disappointed , upset, all sorts of things, right .

Alexis 33:07

E . .

Blessing 33:08

But I can hope that our friendship and the investments I've made to date will hold in the face of that disappointment and if it doesn't , that's a signal that I get to decide what I do with that information . Right .

Alexis 33:22

They also should know about you how important your partner is to you and how important it is for you to be able to spend the time with them . I love all of that . I think it's great . So I mean , I've "why already reacted real time here . I love the triangle and the way that you were pulling these three elements together . I thought was really beautiful .

Alexis 33:45

But what was also interesting to me is that the order in which you describe them in the book is the opposite order of how I approached life when I was getting started in my career . So when I think about my first why I was launching from home and from college and going out into the world , my why was to establish myself as independent , self-sufficient . I mean , that was effectively my meaning at that point in my life . I picked up and I moved to New York , which scared the living daylights out of me . This was not at all where I was supposed to be going . I'd talk about this on other episodes but anyway , I knew a couple people , but I didn't know very many people and basically I deprioritized my community and my freedom in pursuit of being able to establish my independence , my independence .

Alexis 34:39

And I was lucky because I at least had found a job in a crazy job market and I was able to establish a new and great community . There were some folks from college who were there and then I started playing volleyball and got connected with this whole volleyball community there . That was awesome . But you know , it's so funny because you start with freedom and I think so much of what people and the world values today is independence and freedom and the ability to choose what you're doing , when , and not have other people take all your stuff . But when you're getting started in your life , freedom is actually kind of the first thing that needs to go .

Alexis 35:26

To be honest , yes , yes , you know I think this is one of the things that's really hard for . Like there's , you know , young adults , you know they're finishing college and they're . They're like I should only work 40 hours a week , I can't work beyond that and like I just know . Granted , everyone gets to make their choices about what they're doing , but they're like I need to make like a gazillion dollars and I also need all of the work-life balance and you can't call me and you can't expect me Like something's got to give on all of that there Like you can't have all of those things .

Alexis 36:01

I mean , this is what grit is .

Alexis 36:03

And when I think about my earliest years in my career , grit was so core to what I was doing , and it was part of . What I also think is so important in that time , too is that there are so many skills and capabilities that you don't learn until you are in the working world and you only get to do them by virtue of having jobs and trying to do things and trying to make ends meet and make a living , and you have responsibility for all of this stuff and you need to put in the time for it , but I do think it's something that is not highlighted as much in the career discussions as it should Like . I do think you need to put in hard work .

Blessing 36:51

Yes , and time hard work , and time at work is hard work , and time in relationships is hard work , and time it's in all the things . Because at the same time , you talked about how there's a real focus on freedom . Relationships have gotten super fragile and people are very quick to say I don't need that person in my life , I'm just going to cut that person off . And at the same time , we have the highest , almost epidemic , level of loneliness in the world . We're more connected than ever , but we're also lonelier than ever . Quote connected , quote connected , right , yes , and it's because we're not willing to quote do the work .

Blessing 37:35

And what I talk about in the book is . There's a chapter I start with life sucks and you know , and it's just like reality check , life is not fair . I'm currently raising a teenager and when we talk about things , hank goes but mom , that's not fair . I'm like , yep , it's not , but it's factual . Get with the program bud . And it's real , exactly . And so how do you navigate it ? You want to have a relationship . That takes hard work . It takes showing up , it takes going on dates , it takes getting rejected .

Alexis 38:08

It takes heartbreak and it's heartbreak in all of the ways in love , in career , in pouring your heart and soul into athletics or work of any sort and then getting rejected or not getting any response at all .

Blessing 38:26

Yeah , what I talk about is how freedom is good . If you want to be alone for the rest of your life , you can be as free as you want , you can do whatever you want , you can live anywhere . But if you realize and accept which is the whole point of the book that hard work is inevitable , you're going to have to do hard work one way or the other . What you can control is making your hard work meaningful . You can make it matter , you can make it be on things that you care about . You can make it , you know , take you somewhere . So I'll give you an example , and this is this also . I talk about this a little bit in the book . I talk about fitness . During COVID , I was working oh , I was starting my day at eight . I was working till 10 some days . I was working on Saturdays and Sundays . We went nowhere . So I was working all the time .

Alexis 39:19

Well , we were all terrified that the company was going to collapse . We were going to get fired , by the way . All of the things that everyone's still worried about today .

Blessing 39:28

There you go , and when I wasn't working because I'm a doer I was baking . And so guess what ? I was sitting for hours and eating pastries .

Alexis 39:40

Delicious pastries .

Blessing 39:43

But at the end of COVID I had gained 20 pounds .

Alexis 39:47

Homemade delicious pastries .

Blessing 39:50

You're not helping . I want some of them now . I'm going to . I plan to do some waking this weekend . We have a long weekend , so but the point is , when COVID finally ended and you know , we started talking about going back in person into the office , I realized that my clothes didn't fit and so I had to lose those 20 pounds , and I could say , oh well , I'm going to look for a quick fix .

Blessing 40:15

But I also know that , like I need to be strong and healthy and I had dealt with health issues in the past it was very important for me to take care of my body . And so the hard work to lose 20 pounds and keep them off , like it was a no brainer for me . There's no teas , there's no pills , there's nothing . I'm like I'm just going to move my body and sweat until this all burns off Right , and so it's just , it's hard work . I'm going to have to work hard anyway . It has to mean something , and so my why became ? I want strong knees . I want to be able to go and play basketball with my son . I want to be able to run . I want to be able to enjoy my body . I love to dance . I want to be able to enjoy how I look in swimwear and I gave myself a bunch of whys and that made me get up and go to the gym . On days I didn't feel like it . On days I felt sore .

Alexis 41:10

I love the beautiful vision setting you just described there . I mainly use grit . I start going to the gym and I go to the gym because actually my main reason for going to the gym is my mental health .

Blessing 41:23

Yeah .

Alexis 41:23

Yeah , I do want to add one thing as what I was describing for , because I want to actually be clear . My path coming out of college was that I needed to get a job and do all the things and become financially independent . Everyone can pick their own thing . That might not be your thing , that's fine . I would also say that my community and my relationship suffered as a result of it , and I didn't actually even meet Jeff , who's now my husband . We met first in , I think , 2008 . He asked me on a date . I said I don't date co-workers , but we can be friends , right . High five , actually . We did a high five at our wedding . You may now high five the bride , because the next part of the story is we lost touch for two years , oh my . And two years later we reconnected and I was actually now in a place where I was capable and interested and willing to do the work of .

Alexis 42:25

Actually , I had not had successful dating relationships at this point in my life . I had come to the realization of like , hmm , what's the common thread here ? Oh wait , it's me . And so I finally was ready to have a relationship , and that was actually the point at which we started dating . And you know , that's one of the things of like I always had looked at other people , like there's people I know who met each other in high school or grade school and they dated forever and anyway , we don't need to go off but like that was not my reality , that was not what was in front of me , those were not the opportunities and the things that presented themselves . There was actual real hard work I wound up needing to do .

Alexis 43:10

I chose

Balancing priorities, and the realities of tradeoffs & seasons

Alexis 43:11

my pathway through there and I prioritized my career . But that was an intentional decision . And I remember there was a discussion I had with my dad at some point because I was working at Accenture and I was traveling all the time . Dad at some point , because I was working at Accenture and I was traveling all the time , and I don't remember if he asked me a question or if I just told him , but there was basically a discussion about like well , I'm going to be on the road . You know I'm committing to getting promoted . I'm going to be on the road all the time for the next two years . I'm not dating , like I'm not focused on dating . This is not my time to do that I'm , but that was . There was a very intentional , forward looking plan that I had there and I decided that my career in moving up was the most important thing , and thankfully that's okay , yeah , it's okay , and thankfully for me it wound up working out in the end .

Alexis 43:59

There's many ways that that all could have gone too , but but I think that's also ultimately what you talk about in the end . There's many ways that that all could have gone too , but I think that's also ultimately what you talk about in the book is by design . My design was this is the top priority right now . There's other things that I want . I'll pick those up at a later time . I'll reassess and do all that .

Blessing 44:17

I think that one of the things and I read Sheryl Sandberg's book Lean In when it was published and I struggle with the idea that you can have it all all the time consistently I think that real life is full of trade-offs and so it's kind of like understanding that your life has seasons and then the seasons where you're not as available . Like you said , I'm not dating , and that's . I love that , because the the opposite is , you would want to try to date and then travel and then do all those things and you end up ghosting people and hurting their feelings and hurting your feelings and stressing and we just say I'm not doing this right now , I'm just not able to , I don't have the capacity for this right now and I'm going to pick it up at a later date . For me , it was deciding to have my son early . It was just saying you know what ? I want to have kids and be done with it . I don't want to have kids past a certain age . And you know what that meant was when .

Blessing 45:18

I remember when my son was very young , because I wanted to also be present for him and present with him . You know , I made significant social sacrifices and I had a very good friend who had chosen to defer childbirth to much later and we were co-workers and she would go hey , we should go out tonight . And it's Friday . What are you doing ? Oh , I'm doing homework and meal prep . That's what I'm doing tonight . She's like , oh , you're so boring . I'm like , well , I don't think I am . Have you tried meal prepping with a five-year-old ? It's not boring at all , it's exciting . And we kind of like I love her and she . She meant it all in good humor and now she has two kids under 10 and she gets it now my son is going off to college and we can never connect .

Blessing 46:04

And I'm like you're never available and she's like , no , I have to take so and so to basketball and so and so have soccer and and I'm like , oh , the roles have changed , right , you're now in a different season of life and I'm in a different season . I'm more , I have more social capital , almost . But again it's just building relationships around you . You know , one of the things I talk about is my friendships cannot be expensive at high maintenance . I need to have friends that know that I love them , even if I don't see them in three weeks and I can't be available . You know as much as I was in my 20s , and so it's kind of thinking about does this relationship energize you or exhaust you ? You kind of work yourself up to get there and you work yourself up to stay excited , and then when you're done with this person , you're just like , oh , you know like I'm so over it .

Alexis 46:56

All right , so let's move on to another question . You are

Common questions people look for coaching and support on

Alexis 47:00

also a certified coach and you've been coaching and mentoring people for years . Yeah , Can you share some of the most common types of questions that your clients or the people who report into you ? What are they asking you for help on ?

Blessing 47:15

So I am a coach . I focus on career . There's all kinds of coaches . There are coaches that are generalists , a coach in everything . I chose to focus on career and career development .

Blessing 47:25

Like you know , we've done a lot of work on this in the past . Like professional and career , development has always been super important to me , and so what that means is that a lot of my clients come to me with something to do with their jobs or their careers , and so it's things like well , I want to get promoted this year and I need support making sure that I can put up the best case I can be ready it could be . I think I want to change companies or , you know , I want to move from this team to this team . I want to move from being a consultant to an engineer or something like that . Sometimes it is , you know , dealing with toxic teams , dealing with toxic managers or team members .

Blessing 48:02

Work-life balance . Burnout prevention was very popular right after COVID . I also found out that in a lot of cases , the presenting issue is the thing that your client says they want to talk about . It's not usually the actual issue , and so when you peel the layers a little bit , you find out that it is something completely different from where we started , and so I ended up going from Korea into life and relationships and values , and you know belief systems and things like that . So for me it is very fascinating and honestly humbling for me to , as a coach , come alongside really brilliant people as they get their what I call the aha moment , and that's the moment in the session that you , just , you see that it clicked . You , just , you , just , you know . Their eyes light up , their shoulders drop , there's a big smile and for me that's like , that's like yes , you know , like yeah , that's a win is it always a smile ?

Alexis 48:58

I feel like it can be big eyes and like , oh what ?

Blessing 49:04

Is that . It's really that moment of oh , you just made me think about this , this , this and this . Oh , I just realized that this is a completely different problem . Or , oh , I just realized that I've been in my own way this whole time and I'm like , yep , you got it . Now , what are you going ? And at that point we just can't we pivot to action planning . So now , what are you going ? And at that point we just can't we pivot to right action planning . So now , what are you going to do ? Oh , I'm going to go have that conversation . Oh , I'm going to send that email . Oh , I'm going to take that time off , whatever right ? So , yes , those are the usual issues . I don't think they're unique . I think those issues are as old as time .

Alexis 49:36

in terms of the the types of things that I've coached and mentored on , I would say they're very much in the same boat . Most of them started with I want to get promoted or I want to get a different job and , as you started peeling back the conversation , I think many times people had they thought they were putting themselves out there and doing all of the things already . That is , you started asking them well , have you done this , what ? Or ? Oh no , but that's not what I need to like .

Alexis 50:07

I'm focusing on this other thing and it's like you gotta do this other thing too , especially in career , when it's so focused on the idea of getting a promotion or getting higher ratings and whatnot , you know , those do tend to be much more tactical and focused , but at some point , when people start hitting their heads against the wall and they can't break through , that , I think , is where a lot more of the value-based kinds of conversations , like they start opening up of like well , maybe I , you know , like , do I really want that ? By the way , it's okay if you don't actually really want all of those things that you're going after . I think that's for me . That's what your book the value-based discussions . It's really forcing you to think through what actually matters the most to me to be number one on the list , number two or number 10 , or not even make the top thing of the list .

Alexis 51:06

Yeah , absolutely Any of those are totally acceptable . I mean , I know for me it had been at the top of my list and then at some point other things took over and wound up being more important and suddenly I was like , oh wait , maybe , actually , maybe I should rethink all these things . But I think for me , one of the things that was very interesting is after I quit , or after I announced that I was quitting . I suddenly got all of these requests for people who wanted to talk . Yeah , you know , the conversation was I'm really unhappy in what I'm doing . How did you figure out what you wanted to do ? Yeah , now , I think the great news is I can say I would read Blessing's book and I would do the work , which , by the way , also very interesting .

Alexis 51:50

Following question here , which is the book is a book that you get to read . That's lovely , but there's also a number of practice exercises or prompts that you have in there . How do you expect people to read this ? Like , I read it in two days but I didn't actually do all the work . Like , how long would it take most people to do this ? I don't know .

Blessing 52:12

I think it depends on how much work you've done beforehand . So I designed the book with the idea for it to be a workbook that you come to again and again because you're changing your dynamic , your life is always changing and shifting . So for the exercises in the book , there's a handful of them , anywhere from a half hour to several hours , depending on how much work you've done beforehand . And so , for example , in one of the exercises I recommend working with a coach , a therapist or a mentor , in another , I recommend connecting with leaders across your organization . So , you know , depending on how much of that extra stuff you need to do , they don't all require you sitting by yourself in a dark room and doing the exercises , and so they might require several hours of conversation .

Alexis 52:55

Dark room bawling , just hopefully .

Blessing 53:00

So it really depends itsbydesign . org If you already are deeply self-aware , you've done values , work , you're very in tune with what you want , then you could probably breeze through them very quickly here, one if a lot of the questions feel like whoa , I've never thought about that before , then you probably want to sit with them a little bit longer . What I also did was I provided of the workbooks as standalone artifacts on my website , so if you write up the book and there's no more room , you can print it out and keep going , but that's you know . It's not intended to be perfect either . I encourage people to start and stop and come back to it and see how it feels . The important thing , though , at the end of every exercise is you should learn something about yourself you didn't know before , and you should feel like you can move one step forward towards something you know that you want . By the way , bydesignorg is where

Blessing 53:54

should go if you wanted to get a sneak preview of these and start to realize why you need to read the book .

Hidden traps that can affect your career

Blessing 54:24

? Another question here One of my favorite things to ask people is about traps . So when I think about a trap , you know it's a hidden element that people don't know about or think about that can affect you you . Are there any traps that you've gone through or that you see your clients and your reports going through that

Alexis 54:23

have affected ?

Blessing 54:23

And in their career or their life . There are a few . I think the biggest trap is thinking about your career as this distinct thing separate from the rest of you . It's like you know , like , oh , when I go to work , I put on my work face , and there's no such thing , because you're a human being , you're not a robot . We can't compartmentalize that effectively . What that means is that everything that's happening in the rest of your life affects your performance at work .

Blessing 54:46

A good example , you know , I talked about in the good life triangle . I use that as a foundation to what makes a good career , It your career is one piece of the rest of your life , and so the trap is kind of not working on yourself because you're quote focusing on your career , because the things you don't take care of outside of your job will bleed into your job . If you're not healthy , if you're not in , you don't have life giving relationships . If there's chaos in your home life , if you are unhappy at home and and I've managed several people over the years and it takes a good marriage to notice and say , hey , you're a little off , you've been off for a while , you know , are you okay ?

Blessing 55:30

and you'd hear things like well , you know , our newborn isn't sleeping , and so I'm not sleeping , and so I'm just exhausted yeah , you know or I just went through a and we're trying to figure out who's going to move out and how to split our stuff , and it's super stressful , and so taking care of your life so that you can show up at work and be the baddest we all know that you are is , I think , one of the biggest traps . So it's just like don't use your job as an escape from the hard things in your life . I encourage people to take time off all the time , Like go and deal with that , Go and sleep , you know . Or go and kick your boyfriend out , whatever right . Just go and handle that so that when you show up on Monday , I know that you're 100% there .

Blessing 56:12

One of the things that really made this really empowering to me was in early 2023 , when thousands of people were laid off across multiple companies . I was all over the news . The anxiety was palpable , Like the fear was real . There were news reports of people committing suicide and I thought , oh my goodness , people were terrified . And this again are really smart people . These are not people who don't have technical skills . These are people who are building cutting-edge technology .

Blessing 56:41

But then you get laid off and you feel like your life is so meaningless . It was very heartbreaking . But then the reason for that is when your personal identity becomes so meshed with a company , with a brand , that rejection becomes a rejection of all of "I , because you have become one-dimensional . But if you have a full , robust life , you've got communities , people , friends and things you love . Your job is just one of those things , and so the trap is not building not reframing the relationship you have with your job and with your career and getting clear about the terms of that relationship . This is how much I'm going to give you . This is how much of myself you're going to get . If people wonder , you know , it sounds like , oh well , then you're not going to be a top performer . Actually , I think the opposite is true , because when I'm at work , I'm 100% here . Yeah , I want to be here . I know that this is a time to be here , but when I'm not at work , I don't want to be there .

Alexis 57:39

Yeah , well , I think there's two ways it can work . One of them is you can lean into prioritizing making the most out of your work . There's also the other way , which is quiet , quitting and just stopping showing up fully for anything because you're just like . . . . But I totally agree with that one of basically working for a living instead of living for work .

Alexis 58:06

I definitely struggled with that . I think the other trap and this is one that I talk about in another episode on burnout I have my poem , my spoken word , at the end of the show . That's called I Am A Doer and the last lines are I am a doer and I don't want my doing to be my undoing act . And I mean I think the moral of that one is that I know for me , at some point I had to let go of things . Some point I had to let go of things .

Alexis 58:42

What I realized at some point was I was doing things because I wanted to do them and then I had more expectations and more , you know , I became , I got married , I had kids , I had all these other things . I was a manager , I was . I just I kept on adding to the plate and I didn't let go of anything and at some point it literally was so much that couldn't do it ? anymore

Alexis 59:04

Al my body like started shutting down . And I certainly am not the only person who has gone through this . This is a very common thing that people go through , whether it's burnout and it's work related . By the way , I talk about burnout in all of your different aspects of life you probably have a whole discussion around whether or not burnout is truly an occupational issue , but anyway , I encourage people to think about prioritizing themselves , not just a job .

Alexis 59:34

Or actually , let's clarify , be intentional about what you're doing in the current season and what your goals are and then following through on them .

Alexis 59:43

And when you decide to take something off being at the top of the list , all right . So what am I going to let go of ? Because I need to have room for the other things that I want to do more of . You can't just do it all . It's literally like you can't have it all . You literally can only have some of the things . So which of the things are you going ?

Alexis 1:00:01

to go for All right . Another question here

Power moves that changed our career trajectories

Alexis 1:00:05

I am exploring this idea of power moves throughout the show . These are past actions that you took that wound up changing your trajectory in some way . They have to be in the past because you're always doing things but you never know which are going to be the things that make the biggest impact . Can you think of any power moves in your past that either have to do with getting unstuck or cultivating more joy and satisfaction ?

Blessing 1:00:34

There are a few , but the big one , which is very relevant to our conversation , I think , was deciding to study computer science when I was 13 years old . In my culture , where I was raised in Nigeria , there were three professions you were a lawyer , an engineer or a doctor . That was it . If you weren't any of those three things , your parents would have a huge conversation with you , oh goodness . So imagine 13-year-old me saying to my mom oh , I think I want to . Well , I didn't know it was computer science at the time .

Blessing 1:01:04

What I said to my mom at 13 years old was I think I want to work with robots , was what I said , because I read this book on robotics and I fell in love with it . And my mom was like you have no idea what you're talking about . You're going to grow out of it . But then , three years later , when it was time to kind of start thinking about college , I insisted . I was convinced I'm like I need to find .

Blessing 1:01:23

At that point I knew it was computer science . And so what that meant was you know , it took me two years to find the right course and the right school and my mom did not understand why or what I was trying to do . But bless her heart , like she supported my decision . She was patient with me . She did give me an ultimatum in the second year . It's like you're in school this year or I'm taking control .

Blessing 1:01:49

But I think that choosing that at a time where , when I was 13 , I'd never seen a computer in real life Everything I knew about computers came from movies or books but trusting that conviction and trusting my intuition and trusting that feeling that this is the thing I want to do with my life and my time , set me on a path that kind of led me to where I am in many ways . One of them was I ended up meeting my husband in the same city that I went to university , two months before graduation actually and he and I always joke that if I had gone to school where my mom wanted me to go to school , we you know our paths would never have crossed Right . . . . . . it was

Blessing 1:02:20

So that was a power move as a 13 year old , just really trusting your intuition and your heart . Another , more recent example would be making the Blessing to move to Canada . We moved to Canada by we , I mean myself and my family moved to Canada in 2017 . And it was

Blessing 1:02:36

Alexis 1:02:36

kind

Blessing 1:02:36

of one of those things where you we I mean myself and my family moved to Canada in 2017 . And it was kind of one of those things where , you know , I talk about figuring out what you can control . So for the listeners , I was born and raised in Lagos , nigeria .

Blessing 1:02:47

Nigeria is on the West African coast of the African continent . When I started working with my first multinational , it kind of opened my eyes to the fact that there's a big , wide world out there . At the same time , you know , nigeria as a country was going through a lot of political upheaval and security issues and all of that , and I knew I didn't want that , but I also knew I couldn't control the politics and all of the things . But what I did you know what I could control was where I decided to live . And so , you know , my husband and I said you know what , we're going to give ourselves a few years to figure out where we're going to end up , and so that was a power move . We knew no one in Canada , we had no family here and no friends , and the three of us got on a plane with six suitcases and all of our savings and moved to a different continent . And you know , it's one of the massive decisions that we've made and I would do it over and over again because it was the right decision .

Alexis 1:03:44

Incredible . The main move that I thought about was I've talked about it on another episode , so I won't go too far into it , but it was after I hit my first burnout . I knew the job that I was in , at least in the place that I was at . I couldn't do it and I started applying to different jobs that were interesting but they were kind of scary and they were focusing and flexing some of the skills that I had . But there were a lot of other skills that I didn't actually have for the job and thankfully I was able to get one of them . But what came very evident right away was that I had been sitting in a fixed mindset . I was so comfortable with my job and , while I was irritated and there was resentment and there were a lot of those feelings that I've talked about earlier in the episode , I had all of those things at my job , but it was also . It was safe and it was something that was not necessarily easy , but I knew how to do everything and it was like a known quantity and going into a different job that I literally did not know a lot of the things that I needed to do and I needed to lean on people and be not the best at things . You know , I think that was a really hard thing . But actually going through that and realizing and reminding myself I can do hard things , I can do different things , and then being able to just , you know , change the makeup of what I was doing on the regular , it ultimately led to a much more satisfying way of living . But it was really hard , it was scary , and there was definitely a period of so much uncertainty my confidence was not there , and it was . You know , it was a lot of work to get through that , but I think on the other side it was also . Knowing that I went through it also is something that gives me confidence and is great .

Alexis 1:05:48

We should probably start wrapping this up here . I do have one more question for you , though

Advice for someone who is feeling stuck in their career

Alexis 1:05:52

. Let's say that someone came up to you and said blessing , I am so unhappy in my career . I need to figure out what I'm going to do . What advice would you give them ?

Blessing 1:06:05

So, one of the things that coach training has taught me is to pause before giving advice . There's so many reasons for that , but the chief one , in my opinion , is the advice comes from your life experiences , your filters , your beliefs , your values , and in most cases it doesn't fit the person you're giving it to . So I think about it like it's a well-intentioned gift that the person has no use for . You know so . You did mean well , right , but then you know so . If someone did come to me and said , oh , I'm so unhappy in my career , I need to figure out what to do , the first thing I would do is ask a few questions . I would say what does happiness look like ? Define that . What does that feel like ? What assumptions are embedded into the statement of your job ? Is supposed to make you happy , you know ? Is that a valid assumption ? Let's unpack that . assumption How will you know when you get happy ? How would you measure that ? And so usually , when I would pause and I have learned to say hey , do you just want me to tell you what to do or do you really want to talk about this ?

Alexis 1:07:11

Are you looking to vent, or do you actually . . .

Blessing 1:07:14

Exactly . Like , if you want to vent , I'm happy to sit and listen , I'll listen and I will , you know , nod and I would , you know , pat you on the back and that's okay . Um , but I'm like , do you really want to solve this ? Because we can , like , we can go many different places with that , but and that's what I would do but in terms for the purpose of the podcast and for the listeners , I would say , if you feel like you're unhappy in your career , that's good . That's a signal that something is not quite right . Either you don't have the right level of challenge , you don't feel like you're getting the right recognition , you are in a toxic environment , you're underutilized .

Blessing 1:07:51

I would encourage you to unpack that . Journal through it . One of the things I say in the book a lot is write things down , just write the random thoughts down and just follow them and then , when you feel like you're stuck , find someone you trust that you can talk to about where you got to , and you would find yourself , you know , going to all sorts of places with that . And one of the things that I have decided personally in my career is that my job is not meant to make me happy . My job is a contract that I have with my employer . Yeah , they have very clear expectations of what they need from me in terms of skills and I have very clear expectations of what I need from them in terms of compensation .

Alexis 1:08:34

I need the money . Show me the money .

Blessing 1:08:35

as long as that contract is not broken . broken, We're we're good , . yes Yes ! and And you know , but that's me . That works for me . That may not be true for everybody else , but I have divested my purpose for my job . That's really powerful .

Alexis 1:08:50

Since I love to chime in with my own thoughts on these . This is another one that I've already talked about on other episodes . But it's funny . I've been realizing throughout the course of this conversation you're very good at big vision and value setting . That's actually not how my brain thinks . I think small and I need to just think in the moment and my way of approaching "I'm really unhappy is all right .

Alexis 1:09:16

Well , just start noticing the things that you like to do and do more of them . And if you don't have any of them , go try some new things and, like, find some things that you like and then do more of them . And just, you know , like virtuous cycle of keep on doing them . And also , while you're doing that , notice the things that you don't like and that drain you and stop doing them or do less of them and find ways that you're not going to be doing them anymore . It's not necessarily thinking big picture , it's actually thinking very small picture . But for me , actually thinking about those big strategic ideas unless and until I've started to get some of those small wins that can feel like too much for me . So maybe , if you're not at the place where you're ready to think big , maybe start thinking small and maybe there's some good questions to ask in there and like let them , let them sort of percolate while you're doing all of this .

Blessing 1:10:09

Yeah .

Alexis 1:10:10

But maybe you don't have to answer all of the big questions . Maybe it's like I literally don't know what I'm going to be doing in a year , and that's okay . I've actually I'm okay with that and I actually I think that's kind of like cool .

Blessing 1:10:24

Yeah .

Alexis 1:10:24

All right . Well , thank you so much , Blessing , for being here today . This has been a fantastic discussion . On behalf of our listeners , thank you for being here and for sharing everything .

Blessing 1:10:35

Thank you . Thank you for having me . This has been so much fun .

Alexis 1:10:39

I always love an excuse to talk to you, Blessing, so this has been a great excuse . So thank you . Before we close out our episode today , a request for our listeners If you enjoyed the episode , please subscribe to the show and leave a comment about it in whatever podcast player that you use . You can also head on over to my site , breakoutbooth . com , and sign up for the newsletter . As always , I will share some links to notable references throughout this , and I'll also include a link so that you can find blessing , but you can also go check it out right now . its by design . org

Blessing 1:11:15

Yes , that's correct .

Alexis 1:11:17

Cool , and you can find all the ways to be in touch with her right there . You can also find where to find her book . By the way , the full title is "by design a guide to creating a career you love . Any parting words before we close out here Blessing .

Blessing 1:11:31

I'd like to say you only have one life , but I would say it this way there's only one today . There's only one April 17 , 2025 . This day is never gonna happen again . This moment between you and I is never gonna happen again . And so , thinking about you know , checking with yourself , like you know , in the moment it's like am I liking this time ? Am I liking this time ? Am I liking this moment ? You should do that often and you should course correct . If it doesn't feel good , I like it . That will be my , those will be my parting words .

Alexis 1:12:03

I like it when you do provide the advice , because it's always very great advice . So thank you , and with that I wish our listeners a very fond farewell , and you too , Blessing . And we'll catch up with you next week .

Blessing 1:12:17

Okay , thank you .