I’m happy to announce the release my little career movie at MondayMorningMovie.com. Please check it out and spread the word if you like. I hope you find it inspirational. It is also a marketing tool for me. I am preparing to launch a membershipsite for people looking for career inspiration and motivation…it is called Careerillionaire.com. Thanks for your consideration, I really appreciate it.

How long would it take you to gather up all the information you need to fill out a complete professional history for a job or school application? Would you be able to get your hands on all the data you’d need? Despite the best of intentions and filing efforts, most people struggle to pull together their career and educational histories.

If you’ve ever scrambled to find papers and wracked your brain to piece together dates you’ve held jobs or received educational certifications, then you know what a headache it is to have disorganized professional records.

If you’ve ever agonized over writing a resume because you can’t remember what you accomplished in past positions, then you know the feeling of missing – or almost missing – a deadline to apply for a position.

Or, if you’ve ever not gotten the raise or promotion you were hoping for because you didn’t have your thoughts put together well enough to build your case, then you know firsthand that disorganization can lead to missed opportunities.

Weekly career tracking is important for several reasons.

1. Investing the time to do it now and as you go along will save you time in the long run.
2. Details are much easier to record while fresh in your mind rather than having to hunt for them later.
3. Knowing the specifics and being able to speak confidently about them will help your confidence and credibility when applying, networking, and interviewing.
4. If you ever get stuck in a career rut where you don’t know what to do next, you can get ideas by easily taking an inventory of what you have done previously.
5. Someday you might need a school or college transcript to apply for a job or educational opportunity, and now you will have the details of how to do it at your fingertips.
6. Tracking attendance to conferences and membership in professional associations will ensure you get the most benefit for your time and money spent.

If you haven’t kept up with these details so far, then you’ll have a good bit of extra work to get started, but once you’ve established a baseline record, keeping it up to date will be a piece of cake.

When you take ownership of your career materials and records, you take ownership of your career direction. Career tracking is meant to help you secure the most satisfying, rewarding, and—if you desire—money-making opportunities at any moment in time.

It is about taking responsibility for yourself.
Your career is your own and it belongs to no one else. You have within you the power to create it, to live it as an expression of your unique talents and energy. The other choice is to work at the whim of others, not usually a positive place to be since it is difficult to be inspired and enthusiastic when you believe the choice was someone else’s. Instead, be empowered knowing that you are in control! You may not always choose the activities of your day but you do choose the spirit in which you complete each task. Focus on what you are doing and enjoy the process. Spend some time working to understand yourself in order to better communicate that to your personal network, potential employers, clients, project managers, and partners to secure the best-fit opportunities for you at any moment in time.

It is about creating your future.
It involves self-reflection, learning, researching, planning, and/or talking a little everyday about accomplishments, potential, and opportunity. It is not an obsessive thing though. It is more about going with the flow in a productive manner yet always honoring where you are right now in the process so that your day-to-day work is a source of fulfillment and positive energy.

It is about choices.
Career and personal development is an ever evolving process of making more and better distinctions of who you are and what you want during different phases of your life. Career development is influenced by your whole life…your own changing roles as well as personal and economic circumstances. You will be choosing again and again to create the path of your personal career development throughout your lifetime. You will also make choices each day about how you feel about your work and the attitude and energy you will bring to it and take from it.

It is about rapid change.
Today’s world of work is highly competitive and in a constant state of flux. We can no longer expect to stay with the same company for 20 years then retire. The current environment is much more dynamic with many more opportunities for success when an individual properly manages their own career and personal development.

It is about quality of life.
Think about it, what is a career? It is about the work you do over time and involves such ideas as your productivity, the way you contribute, how you are driven to spend your non-leisure time. Some people are driven to accomplish lots, others are interested in a simpler and more independent existence. Your career becomes the work activities (whether that is paid or unpaid work –such as volunteers, students, parents, and homemakers) that you participate in during your lifetime. Because of the current complexity and speed of life, managing your own career development is an important task for having some control of your quality of life.

It is about hard work completed with ease.
People who know themselves well (by understanding their strengths, what they enjoy, what they want, what they have already accomplished, what they can uniquely contribute, where they are going) are so easy to spot in their enthusiasm and confidence. They are like a breath of fresh air so people and opportunities are drawn to them like vacationers to a sunny beach!

Okay, so it doesn’t have to be total bliss but it should not be career hell either. I mean look at what often happens to people who stay in jobs they hate…stress and health issues, negative effect on relationships, and overall poor quality of life — what a bust!

But food does need to get to the table and sometimes despite all your best preparations and intentions, you don’t know that the job you just accepted is a buster until you are in it. From there you have a few options.

• Assuming you are financially able, admit the mistake asap and get the heck out of dodge within the first few months on the job. Don’t do it more than once or you are demonstrating poor decision making skills but it is a once in a decade option if need be and it can become a “lessons learned” story.

• Follow the advice of Eckert Tolle and learn to drop the emotion, frustration, anxiety, and anger around the situation and be fully conscious and egoless in the present moment. This approach will help you stay in the job you accepted and it will help you to make a smoother transition overall when the time comes.

• Hang in at the job remembering to take care of yourself a bit more than usual on your time off. Give yourself plenty of opportunities for rejuvenating exercise and recreation. Also, give yourself permission to further explore your interests and be open and creative about possibilities for your next career move.

There is definitely something to be learned by studying those who find their success by following their bliss. I believe following your interests is so important because interests are often little taps from intuition pointing to flow experiences and other types of abundance.

A widely held myth about careers is that there is a perfect one out there for everyone. That is not true because there are actually several careers out there that would be a good match for you! Isn’t that exciting news? I believe it is. For one thing, this point of view relieves the burden of continually seeking the perfect match in order to find career happiness. Instead you are free to focus on where you are currently in your journey allowing life and opportunity to unfold in ways more satisfying than you could have planned. I think this is primarily due to the enthusiasm that will shine through you when you give yourself permission to embrace your unique strengths and interests. That enthusiasm then serves as a strong attractor of people and circumstances to propel you on your way.

“When you follow your bliss…doors will open where you would have thought there would not be doors, and where there would not be a door for anyone else.” —Joseph Campbell

Careerillionaires have a zest for their work which feeds their zest for life. Most of the time they are happy and energetic and generally a breath of fresh air. They seem above the fray and are usually relaxed and composed. They are proud of their contributions and move along with confidence and ease. They will talk to anyone about what they do for a living with pride and enthusiasm.

How can anyone have that?

It begins with knowing it is possible, and believing you can tap into that kind of abundance. See yourself in those shoes. Imagine that others find you joyful to be around and that even complete strangers will support you in your goals. Be cognizant of when you are in a zone, when things are coming easily. These “flow” experiences are major hints that you are on the right track and they will help you identify your passion.

Most importantly, live in the present moment, the now. Sure, set goals and spend a small amount of time periodically thinking about what you want to get done and what you desire to achieve in the short and long term. But then get to work doing what can be done right now.