Career advice

 George Monbiot was considered to be a bit of an eco pin-up, if there is such a thing, by the younger women in the university department where I used to work. There was many a moment of swooning when he came to speak at an event. George is an independent voice on a whole range of subjects. Not only does he write books, he also publishes regular comment pieces in the London Guardian newspaper. In addition he keeps an interesting blog on his website. A recent post was on the subject of career advice, in this case he writes specifically about careers in journalism, however, on reading it the advise could just as easily apply to most fields of work. 

In his piece he suggests "This is not to say that there are no opportunities to follow your beliefs within the institutional world. There are a few, though generally out of the mainstream: specialist programmes and magazines, some sections of particular newspapers, small production companies whose bosses have retained their standards. Jobs in places like this are rare, but if you find one, pursue it with energy and persistence. If, having secured it, you find that it is not what it seemed, or if you find you are being consistently pulled away from what you want to do, have no hesitation in bailing out.

Nor does this mean that you shouldn’t take work experience in the institutions whose worldview you do not accept if it’s available, and where there are essential skills you feel you can learn at their expense. But you must retain absolute clarity about the limits of this exercise, and you must leave the moment you’ve learnt what you need to learn (usually after just a few months) and the firm starts taking more from you than you are taking from it. How many times have I heard students about to start work for a corporation claim that they will spend just two or three years earning the money they need, then leave and pursue the career of their choice? How many times have I caught up with those people several years later, to discover that they have acquired a lifestyle, a car and a mortgage to match their salary, and that their initial ideals have faded to the haziest of memories, which they now dismiss as a post-adolescent fantasy? How many times have I watched free people give up their freedom?

So my second piece of career advice echoes the political advice offered by Benjamin Franklin: whenever you are faced with a choice between liberty and security, choose liberty. Otherwise you will end up with neither. People who sell their souls for the promise of a secure job and a secure salary are spat out as soon as they become dispensable. The more loyal to an institution you are, the more exploitable, and ultimately expendable, you become."

For more advice from George click on the link above.

One Earth One Race

Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq is an Eskimo-Kalaallit Elder whose family belongs to the traditional healers of the Far North from Kalaallit Nunaat, Greenland. He share a simple message. Well worth watching.

Worth a Gander

Let it go

Michael Leunig is a fabulous Australian cartoonist and a brilliant artist too boot.
I love how this image illustrates the way our path is provided by letting go, letting it out, letting it all unravel !!!

Medicine Song from Sierras

Click on the words in Orange and you'll hear an opening introduction that describes how the Medicine Song from the Sierras came into being. Here sung by Sam Edmondson who was given the song by a mountain while he was on a solo vision quest in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

Medicine Song from Sierras 

Try closing your eyes and allow the sound to flow over you, through you, under you, all around you, and ask yourself the question;  won't you open up and flow like a river?

Thanks to Filiz Telek for recording and sharing this beautiful song.

Being Lost

This poster marks the entrance to a special exhibition currently running at the British Library. Not all those who wander are lost, is a quote by JRR Tolkien from Lord of the Rings. You can take your own meaning from this. It is noticeable that so often being lost is a derogatory term. Especially for someone like me who enjoys pouring over a good map to discover where I am. Who prides themselves on having a good spatial awareness to find my way around. Despite these qualities I have to admit for a while now I have been lost. Not so much geographically. More lost in myself. In knowing who I am and what it is I am here to do. Only recently have I truly come to feel into what that means and boy have I been fighting it. Fighting with my feelings of being lost.

In response I'm on the lookout for structure to provide some semblance of knowing to cling onto as I try to find my way out of the malaise. Seeking in some way to stop the realisation that I have utterly no idea where I am, who I am or what to do!!! It's a peculiar place to be. Now I understand the saying, 'I'm running to stand still', because the more I try to not be lost, well the more I am lost and stay lost.

So, what am I to do?

Maybe I should try and get familiar with the lost feeling. Check out the terrain in lostville, possibly slowdown the search out of town and try to stop fighting the lostness, at least for a while and see what happens. Easier said than done when all my core instincts are seeking to not accept being lost. I sense my struggle is less about not wanting to be lost and more about not wanting to accept being lost. It feels way to unsettling, uncomfortable, disconcerting and downright unnerving to contemplate accepting the state of lostness.

Even as I write this I sense my playfulness is another avoidance tactic to prevent my feelings of truly being lost from creeping to the surface. Why? Because it is overwhelming. In the darkest times it feels like a tunnel with no light and my sense of self is dissolving into nothingness. Listlessly the weight of inertia drags me down further into nothingness and procrastination drains whatever energy may have been there. The indecision is cripplingly frustrating creating a fog like existence.

Don't get me wrong here, my life certainly has its high points and its good times. I have much to be grateful for, nevertheless, the inescapable lack of direction, motivation and purpose is palpable. The not knowing is a huge cloud floating above my head casting its shadow. And yet today I read in Bill Plotkin's book Soulcraft that being lost is a good thing. Out of the darkness gems are to be found that teach us a new way of being. I am being lead to beleive in my confusion the shape of a new identity is being forged.

I look forward to some signs of new beginnings to emerge from this cocoon I'm in. A shape not yet known or seen by myself. I want to believe that is what is happening. More than that I want to feel this is what is happening. I can only be patient some more and wait ... and dare I say it, Trust that all is as it's meant to be and all will be well. If I am prepared to say this to others I now must say it to myself. Patience and Trust. All will be well. All is as it's meant to be.

Silence is Golden