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Carter Visit and Character Survey

When I traveled to Georgia last month to see President Jimmy Carter teach Sunday School, it made me think about the concept of character.

I want to share a bit of my trip and also a link to a free character strengths profile.

When I was researching my trip, I was heartened to see comments from Republicans about admiration for Carter as a person even if they did not agree with aspects of his presidency. I have admired his character and spiritual grounding for many years.  I first saw him when he campaigned at the Beaver Valley Mall and volunteered for his campaign as a senior in high school.  His message at the Sunday School Class was one of love, service and peace.  At 94 he was sharp and witty. If you want to check things out for a pilgrimage/bucket list, go to maranathabaptistchurch@yahoo.com. Plan on a long night.  I arrived at 3:03 AM and was car 35 winning me a seat in the third to last pew. People attending were from across the US as well as international visitors.

In thinking about character in the workplace I wanted to share some research, so here is a link to those of you who may want to delve in.  I moved in a different direction when I enjoyed some synchronicity with a mastermind group of career counselors.  Some of them use the Character Strengths Profile.  From my own experience of taking it, I prefer to address the four core parts of self-assessment (interests, skills, personality, and values…what you want from a job) separately.  The profile combined aspects, and I find it simply a nice self-awareness and self-development tool.

Click here if you would like to take the free 15 minute VIA Institute on Character survey.

As a reminder and motivation for us all about character, I’m listing the core traits as noted by VIA here:

  1. Wisdom: creativity, curiosity, judgment, love of learning, perspective
  2. Courage: bravery, perseverance, honesty, zest
  3. Humanity: love, kindness, social intelligence
  4. Justice: teamwork, fairness, leadership
  5. Temperance: forgiveness, humility, prudence, self-regulation
  6. Transcendence: appreciation of beauty and excellence, gratitude, hope, humor, spirituality

Finally, I’d like to close with a quote:

“I have one life and one chance to make it count for something… My faith demands that I do whatever I can, wherever I am, whenever I can, for as long as I can with whatever I have to try to make a difference.”

― Jimmy Carter

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Good Market = Good Time to Explore

A good job market is a good time to explore a career or job change.  Would you like to be happier?  It’s much easier to make a move when you aren’t worried about just hanging onto a job in a bad market.

Pittsburgh has been in the news multiple times this past year for a top job market. In January of this year WalletHub noted Pittsburgh as #15 in its list of Best Places to Find a Job from research of 180 cities.  In October 2018, Glassdoor put Pittsburgh at #1. Click here for the article.

A May 28, 2019 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article gave highlights of more good news. The Pittsburgh region has seen a record low unemployment at 3.8% in April. The good job market has resulted in overall pay rising at 5.4% compared with 1% in PA and 2.5% nationwide. Top growth industries currently are construction, leisure/hospitality, and to a lesser degree, education.

If you’ve been thinking about a next move….if not now, when? I’d be happy to help!

Work and Love Quotes

“Work is love made visible.”

 Khalil Gibran

“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Confucius

“Everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart.”

Rumi

“Do what you love. When you love your work, you become the best worker in the world.”

Uri Geller

“Doing what you love is the cornerstone of having abundance in your life.”    

Wayne Dyer

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”     

Steve Jobs

“Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.”     

Aristotle

“The secret of joy in work is contained in one word – excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it. “   

Pearl S. Buck

“There comes a time when you ought to start doing what you want. Take a job that you love. You will jump out of bed in the morning.”

Warren Buffet

“Just don’t give up trying to do what you really want to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong.”

Ella Fitzgerald

“Paul and I, we never thought that we would make much money out of the thing. We just loved writing software.”

Bill Gates

 

“Never continue in a job you don’t enjoy. If you’re happy in what you’re doing, you’ll like yourself, you’ll have inner peace. And if you have that, along with physical health, you will have had more success than you could possibly have imagined.”

Johnny Carson

The people who make it to the top – whether they’re musicians, or great chefs, or corporate honchos – are addicted to their calling … [they] are the ones who’d be doing whatever it is they love, even if they weren’t being paid.”

Quincy Jones

“If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, go out and sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures. Sweep streets like Handel and Beethoven composed music. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say, here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well.”

Martin Luther King, Jr.