Kerry Hannon - Love your job: the new rules of career happiness

Kerry Hannon

Creative Director: Scott A. Davis
Cover Design: Lesley Q. Palmer Photograph: Elizabeth Dranitzke, Photopia

Copyright 2015 by Kerry Hannon. AARP is a registered trademark. All rights reserved..

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.
Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Portions of the material originally appeared in NextAvenue.org and AARP.org. Reprinted with permission.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Hannon, Kerry.
Love your job : the new rules of career happiness/Kerry Hannon.
pages cm
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-118-89806-2 (paper); ISBN 978-1-118-89804-8 (ePDF); ISBN 978-1-118-89805-5 (ePUB)
1. Job satisfaction. 2. Career development. 3. Employee motivation. I. Title.
HF5549.5.J63H276 2015
650.1dc23

2014043441

For my mom, Marguerite Sullivan Hannon

All I really need to know about loving work I learned from Zena, my Labrador retriever. My resolution has always been to try as hard as I can to follow her example.

Start the day with gusto. Zena wakes with a mission. Shes motivated. And shes determined to motivate me. She stands beside my bed, rests her head on the mattress, her eyes level with mine, and stares piercingly, willing me to get up.

Shes always eager to face the outside world. In fact, she charges into it, and returns to dive into her breakfast with delight. Then shes ready for a vigorous workout to stay physically fit. Thats a 40minuteplus walk either around the sidewalks of the city or through the woods and fields, depending on where we are that day.

Focus on a task. Zenas singular ability to concentrate all her mental and physical energy allows her to achieve winning performance. Shes a pro at what she does, and she devotes her whole heart and all her abilities to every project. Shes absorbed with every sinew and nerve. Shes vibrant and alive.

Throw a Frisbee, ball, or stick, and shes off, tearing down the field, knowing instinctively when to pivot and leap to catch it. She dives with abandon into ponds, and swims with the strength and pure beauty of a canine athlete, making a direct beeline to her goal in record time.

As far as I can tell, she never blocks out the pure enjoyment these moments offer by letting other matters distract her. Admittedly, she is free from worrying about finances, fitness, or health. Instead, she delegates those matters to me.

Stay present. Zena is wholly present, in the moment, with all her beinga state that comes naturally to her. Her attentiveness to what shes engaged in is never clouded by her future ambitions or the need to return emails, to tweet, or to juggle three jobs at once to keep her business prosperous.