At fifteen, my first job was that of a waitress at a local truck stop. One day, back then, I happened to meet the elementary principal of my past. She mentioned she had heard I was working part time and wondered at what.

Shamefacedly I mumbled, "Oh, I am just a waitress." That wise, old, stern headmistress said to me, "Teresa, any job is an honorable job. Don't you ever forget it!" And I never have.

Of course, seeing the honor in our job is not always an easy task.

Our societal values make it difficult to honor so-called menial jobs. Our sick societal values esteem big bank accounts, fancy houses, new cars, extended paid vacations, prestigious jobs, beautiful, youthful looks, and perfectly cloned behaviors. These societal values wring the worth from the vast majority of hard-working folk.

Create your own values by looking for the honor and worth in your work now. Any honest day's work is honorable and worthy. Finding the honor and goodness in everything you do builds dignity and honor within you.

Even if you wanted to career change but instead returned to the field you had hoped to leave, remember, there is huge honor and courage in this. Taking care of your family and responsibilities does not mean you are a failure. It means you are a responsible, caring human being.

If you cannot find any worth in your current job, that lack of worth will likely haunt your career change. Before jumping jobs, seeking fulfillment elsewhere, consider your current job as sacred work.

Monastic writers have described their day-to-day, menial work as the path to holiness. Your job is much more than a means to pay bills. Try envisioning your job as your ministry.

As Martin Luther King Jr. advised, “Whatever your life work is, do it so well that no one else could do it better. If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, like Shakespeare wrote poetry, like Beethoven composed music. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street sweeper.”

Turn your work into a form of personal and spiritual growth by doing it exceedingly well, as one form of service to the world. I have a very health conscious, spiritual friend who, at this moment in her life, sells lottery tickets, liquor and cigarettes in a liquor store to help pay her bills.

Rather than bitterly resent her position, she has made it her ministry to create a positive atmosphere, giving kindness and care to every human being that passes through those doors. Not surprisingly, wonderful little miracles occur often. (And yes, she is also doing the groundwork to create new employment.)

Rarely are things what they seem to be on the surface. In every relationship, in every job, and in every life experience there is much more going on than meets the eye.

"The three foundations of spirituality:
hearth as altar,
work as worship and
service as sacrament."

A Compilation of Triads, Volume I John F. Wright

We are always being called to see the bigger picture and to grow nearer to our soul. To find more meaning within the work you do now, query your soul as to the larger view.

Try sitting quietly for awhile. Practice letting go of passing thoughts while lightly noticing your breath coming in and going out. Relax your body and mind. Ask your soul, "What is my work really about. What work am I really doing here?"

When I had grown weary of facilitating the same career assessment program for nine years, I sat and asked my soul this same question. Within the whisper of my small, still voice I heard the truth, "You are bringing light and hope to people."

The work I was doing was not about self assessment tools or job search but about bringing light and hope to people. From that day onward the program was no longer repetitive for me and as I gained more depth and meaning in my work, so did the program.

When we see our work as sacred and honorable, we feel good about what we are doing and who we are. This goodness spins off into our family, workplace and ultimately the world.

This also, builds an ideal foundation for career change, if we so desire. From honoring ourselves and our current work we can then successfully begin taking small steps towards change.

Welcome to our "Free Quality Articles" that you may use as content on your site. Teresa Proudlove is a well-published writer who worked as a successful columnist for twelve years. Teresa has also been inspiring, supporting, and guiding over 3000 people upon their career and life paths for fourteen years - with compassion and heart.

If you would like to reprint any of these articles or parts thereof, please do so. We simply request that you state the article title; credit the author, Teresa Proudlove; include her brief bio; and attach a hot-link to www.yourlifework.com.

Teresa Proudlove's Bio Teresa Proudlove; storyteller, coach, internationally published writer and entrepreneur helps people remember their authentic Self and gifts. Living her passion, Teresa has lead thousands of people through her “Livelihood” workshops. With wisdom and heart Teresa inspires people to create the life and work they love.

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Many people today have lost jobs after decades of service; many others suffer within jobs they can see no way out of. In order to survive a painful job loss - indeed, any type of painful loss - we must come to some acceptance.

How does one find acceptance amidst the humiliation, shame, despair, fear, grief and uncertainty job loss can invoke? How do we accept financial insecurity threatening our lives and our family?

Rarely, can we skip over our painful feelings, wave a wand and create new employment in short order. Often, we want difficult life situations to be some other way.

Yet, if we resist accepting the situation and our mixed bag of feelings we inevitably end up fighting ourselves and the world. Acceptance is the path back to peace.

As they say in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, "Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today... I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is suppose to be at this moment. Nothing, absolutely nothing happens in God's world by mistake."

We cannot force ourselves into peaceful acceptance. Coming to acceptance is often a volatile emotional journey occurring over time. To begin the journey toward acceptance try letting go of analyzing or attempting to "figure out" the "why's" of the situation and seek trust.

Realizing every life experience has a purpose - even if beyond our knowing - helps pave the way to acceptance. Just holding what we cannot resolve or understand within our hearts moves us closer to acceptance.

As we aspire toward acceptance of life's challenges, grace gifts us with a measure of comfort and solace.

"My life is but a weaving between my Lord and me.
I cannot choose the colors He worketh steadily.
Oftimes He weaveth sorrow, and I in foolish pride
Forget He sees the upper and I, the underside.
Not till the loom is silent and the shuttles cease to fly
Shall God unroll the canvas and explain the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful in the
Weaver's skillful hand
As the threads of gold and silver in the
pattern He has planned."

Author Unknown

One day, world-renowned psychologist, Carl Jung, had a friend arrive at his door wholly distraught from losing his job that very day. Carl Jung, invited his friend into his home and said, (with my paraphrasing), "Come. I'll open a bottle of fine Champaign and we'll celebrate as surely, some great good will come about from this job loss."

Losing a job or feeling trapped within a job, is likely a blessing in disguise although in the moment the loss or the fear may seem insurmountable.

When I lost my two retail stores after ten years, my $100,000., my marriage and my self esteem I thought this was one of the worst things that could happen to me in this lifetime.

Now, with the clarity of hindsight, I see losing my stores was Divine Intervention. By losing everything I thought I valued, I discovered what was really important to me. I lost every thing but found myself.

"Three earthly losses
which bring gain to the soul:
loss of a friend,
loss of health and
loss of riches."

"A Compilation of Triads," Volume I John F. Wright

In their book, "Life Lessons," Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and David Kessler write,"change...usually begins with a door closing, an ending, a completion, a loss, a death. Then we enter an uncomfortable period, mourning this completion and living in the uncertainty of what is next. This period is hard.

But just when we feel we can't take it anymore, something new emerges: a reintegration, a reinvestment, a new beginning. A door opens. If you fight change, you will be fighting your whole life. That's why we need to find a way to embrace change, or at least to accept it."

Through aspiring to accept life on life's terms we begin to move from feeling like a victim and blaming the world around us. We get glimmers of a larger purpose at work in our lives. Through accepting our lives now, we learn to be kind to ourselves even amidst life's storms. Through acceptance we can find a measure of peace in this moment. Herein, we build the foundation of a life well-lived and build bridges to a new future.

Welcome to our "Free Quality Articles" that you may use as content on your site. Teresa Proudlove is a well-published writer who worked as a successful columnist for twelve years. Teresa has also been inspiring, supporting, and guiding over 3000 people upon their career and life paths for fourteen years - with compassion and heart.

If you would like to reprint any of these articles or parts thereof, please do so. We simply request that you state the article title; credit the author, Teresa Proudlove; include her brief bio; and attach a hot-link to www.yourlifework.com.

Teresa Proudlove's Bio Teresa Proudlove; storyteller, coach, internationally published writer and entrepreneur helps people remember their authentic Self and gifts. Living her passion, Teresa has lead thousands of people through her “Livelihood” workshops. With wisdom and heart Teresa inspires people to create the life and work they love.

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I am absolutely no stranger to the concept of life long learning, particularly in the arena of self discovery. To me, this is the greatest and most important journey of all. One of my greatest teachers was my fortieth birthday. Although I had forty years to prepare for it, the big Four Oh managed to catch me by surprise.

How does forty years pass so quickly? For some odd reason I thought I would be exempt from the aging process. During past birthdays I felt better than the year before, full of life experiences, more confident, competent, and closer to my own beauty. I had the sense of life endlessly expanding before me, until forty loomed near, and then I began to feel haunted.

Haunted by the merciless march of time. The illusion of time spinning endlessly before me was dispelled forever. Forty is a milestone because it marks the end of the first half of life and the beginning of the final sequel on earth. For me, it has been a painful transition viewing my life from this new context. It has pressured me into serious reflection of my past forty years, with the unsettling question arising, "Do I want my next forty years to be like the past forty?" Upon hearing a definite no reply, I spiraled into a spasm of agony and dark well of tears.

Not desiring a repetition of my past, cast a dark veil over the years I had lived. I felt the anguish of having lived so many years for so many others. Years spent trying to be someone I'm not. Trying to please others, win love and acceptance, shape shifting, turning one face then another like a prism of many facets. With a painful futility, common to many women, I sought to find inner worth through the eyes of others. And of course, that inner worth, love and acceptance always eluded me and the outside props repeatedly dissolved and escaped me.

Turning forty forced me to re-evaluate my entire life, values and beliefs. I saw how I had used relationships, careers, and being accepted and recognized by others, as thin veneers to cover my own pain and emptiness. My pain and emptiness sprang from a lifetime of denying myself, refusing to acknowledge my own feelings, my own truth, often making someone else or something else more important. Can there be anything more lonely or painful than the abandonment of self? In the depths of this place, I think not.

This momentous birthday helped me understand I was not wrong throwing myself into the world, seeking to find myself, and make my mark externally during the first half of my life. But it would be tragic if I followed this path for the next forty years, as I would truly face a lonely death, devoid of the spirit of self. Not only did my birthday bring home the pain and shortcomings of my life and the required metamorphosis, but it also reinforced what I had gained through the years.

Many warm, intimate wishes from special people upon this day reminded me of the value friends. My five year old boy and his little 'sister' friend sang me happy birthday ten times and told me I was beautiful. Their pure innocence did much to restore my joy in life and my faith in myself. The three of us blew out the candles upon our cupcakes and made a wish. It was fitting I had but one candle, symbolizing my first year in this new era of life. My wish? I wish to live the next forty years being true to myself.

Welcome to our "Free Quality Articles" that you may use as content on your site. Teresa Proudlove is a well-published writer who worked as a successful columnist for twelve years. Teresa has also been inspiring, supporting, and guiding over 3000 people upon their career and life paths for fourteen years - with compassion and heart.

If you would like to reprint any of these articles or parts thereof, please do so. We simply request that you state the article title; credit the author, Teresa Proudlove; include her brief bio; and attach a hot-link to www.yourlifework.com.

Teresa Proudlove's Bio Teresa Proudlove; storyteller, coach, internationally published writer and entrepreneur helps people remember their authentic Self and gifts. Living her passion, Teresa has lead thousands of people through her “Livelihood” workshops. With wisdom and heart Teresa inspires people to create the life and work they love.

Copyright © 2004 Teresa Proudlove - Yourlifework Enterprises. All Rights Reserved.

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Giving up the quest for a glamorous, youthful look was especially difficult for me as I had been the fashion queen; owning fashion boutiques, doing image consulting and writing a fashion column for ten years. I had felt pity for my sister-in-law years ago, when she decided not to dye her hair.

At that time I vowed to never “let myself go,” and remain as youthful and glamorous as human powers would permit. Yet, rather suddenly, more years of dying my hair passed and I found myself resenting being held hostage every six weeks to grey roots, chemicals soaking my scalp, dark stains along my hairline, and fumes in my eyes and lungs.

More and more I begrudged the societal message clouting us: “Women lose their value, beauty and worth as they age and must do their utmost to hide the fact.” Proof of this message drives the multi-billion dollar beauty/anti-aging industry which goads us into defying nature and negating the beauty, vitality, sexuality and worth of aging, grey-haired women.

Now it is commonplace to perpetually dye greying hair; surgically nip, tuck and lift aging faces; Botox worrisome wrinkles away; lyposuction fat off thighs; enlarge small breasts; pluck “inappropriate” hairs (then draw eyebrows back on!); wear make-up with toxic ingredients; and keep wearing current clothing that was in style when we were teens. Unwittingly, we have been drawn into an anti-aging war being battled upon our bodies.

Each of us has to draw the line between wanting to look good and becoming a slave to twisted societal demands. Where do we say “Enough is enough?” Letting our grey grow is the “road less traveled.”

The idea that we must be beautiful, youthful and lithesome to be acceptable and of worth is deeply ingrained within each of us. It can be an unnerving, shocking journey dumping our societies’ shallow values, and coming to accept our bodies as they are: grey hair, no hair, overweight, wrinkles and all.

Three years ago, when I decided to stop dying my hair, with the support of my husband and young boy, I faced deep fears. Being mid-forties and grey-haired would I lose my man to a younger, prettier woman? Would they see me “on the way out” in my professional career? And what was I to do on those days the mirror reflected an old, unsexy, grey-haired woman? It’s interesting - I had to dig to the depths of my roots - in order to grow-out my roots. To grow grey I had to find the courage of my convictions and move against the mass belief. I had to go beyond my fears to find my own beauty and worth inside.

Now, having experienced grey hair for three years, I can say it is incredibly freeing and comfortable to be who I am, just as I am. To rise above societal beliefs and find our own intrinsic worth, beauty, vitality and sexuality let us begin with accepting, and caring for our bodies and our precious selves.

Given the toxicity of many beauty products and treatments perhaps the question of – “To dye or not to dye?” – should read… “To die or not to die?” that is the question. Welcome to our "Free Quality Articles" that you may use as content on your site.

If you would like to reprint any of these articles or parts thereof, please do so. We simply request that you state the article title; credit the author, Teresa Proudlove; include her brief bio; and attach a hot-link to www.yourlifework.com.

Teresa Proudlove's Bio Teresa Proudlove; storyteller, coach, internationally published writer and entrepreneur helps people remember their authentic Self and gifts. Living her passion, Teresa has lead thousands of people through her “Livelihood” workshops. With wisdom and heart Teresa inspires people to create the life and work they love.

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