Your Job Can Make a Real Difference

There was a time in my life when I took a job to make a difference in the world and little did I know that one of the biggest differences would be the change in me. I'm posting the story because it's good. You don't have to change careers or make huge sacrifices to make a difference. You can make a difference everyday no matter where you are. Part of the work-life balance is work. Your job should count and matter to you. Check out my personal website if you want to learn more about following your bliss. www.josephonesta.com

In 1995, I had a successful career teaching university English in Los Angeles but my personal life was in turmoil. It seemed everyone I knew was in some stage of terminal HIV disease. Hospital visits and memorial services were just a part of life. At 35 years old, I was experiencing the same level of peer loss my parents were experience in their 70’s.

Though I held a lot of hands, ran errands, sat in waiting rooms, it didn’t feel like I could do anything for the people around me. I suffered from something called survivor’s guilt. Why among all my friends was I the one to escape the plague? It seems warped to think that way. I should have been glad that I was free of that virus but being uninfected made me almost a freak. I sometimes felt like I had to apologize for being HIV negative.

I really wanted to do more for them so I made a bold move, some say a crazy move. I quit teaching and took a job working for AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA) cutting my income by about 75%. I created the nation’s premier day program for people living with AIDS. If I couldn’t stop them from dieing, I could help improve their lives in some way.

It was like day camp for people with AIDS. I was a cross between Julie on the Love Boat and Mother Theresa. I recruited, trained and managed volunteers to lead activities and administer services. I solicited donations of goods, services, products and equipment. What I couldn’t get from a volunteer or a donor, I often supplied myself.

It worked! More than 2000 clients participated but instead of being exuberant, I was exhausted. Nothing was ever good enough. They complained, tried to tell me how to do it better, whined when there wasn’t enough and criticized everything. They used characteristic rapier wit to cut me to shreds. I knew it was the frustration they felt in life that made them complain but it still hurt. It still tore me down. Inside of six months, I was beginning to fizzle out.

One day as I scrambled though the crowds setting up activities, handing out vouchers, scheduling appointments, a client stepped into my path and would not move aside until I heard her out. Chantal was six foot four and in transition from being a big, rather unattractive man to being a larger than life, very unattractive woman.

“I need to speak with you,” She held one hand on her hip, the decorated fingernails on the other cutting the air between us. I stopped waiting for yet another complaint. When she knew she had my attention, she spoke. “These bitches are going to chew you up and spit you out. You need to stand up, Joseph.”

Sure, I felt pretty chewed up already but stand up? How could I stand up to the people I was trying to serve? What I needed to do was try harder, work harder, go more. I thanked her for her comment and tried to ease my way around her.

“Oh, no, uh-uh.” she said. “Look at me. Do you think I can live my life without giving myself a pep talk once in a while? When one of these bitches has anything to say to you that doesn’t begin with please or end with thank you, in the back of your mind you need to say to yourself, “I am fabulous!”

When you wake up in the morning, the first words that come to mind should be, “I am fabulous.” Every time you look at your face in the mirror, “I am fabulous.” When you step outside your door to greet the day, “I am fabulous.” Joseph, let me be the first to tell you, I think you are fabulous.”

OK, I admit it. I thought she was nuts. I’d been living in Southern California for five years but I was still a Western Pennsylvanian. This affirmation stuff was kind of a joke to me. Surprisingly, it stuck. Whenever I was having a bad day, I could see Chantal telling me I was fabulous. “I am fabulous” became a kind of mantra that made my work a lot lighter.

“How are you doing today, Joseph?”
“Fabulous, just fabulous.”

After two years of poverty in the name of AIDS, I needed to take another job to dig myself out of the debt I had created for that program. I took a job directing a team of personal finance speakers for Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Los Angeles and one day, I was winding up a speech on credit reports to a room of perhaps 60 people when a person stood up in the back of the room and asked if I had remembered him.

“I am at client at AIDS Project Los Angeles,” he said boldly. “I just want to say that I believe I am alive today because of the man standing in front of this room. His program gave me a reason to live. I had a place to go. I had something to look forward to and I just want to say in front of everyone that I think this guy is…”

Go head. You can finish his sentence…fabulous. Considering when I first started recruiting volunteers for my program, most people with AIDS didn’t live more than two years, perhaps he was right. He had made it well past the two year mark and so did many others. Some are still around today which is more than a miracle.

I don’t take responsibility for miracles. Newer medications and treatments take the spotlight there. I do look back and see a fundamental truth. When you follow your bliss, as Joseph Campbell said, you put your self on track to live the life that you should be living. You line up with the energy of the universe and who knows, the universe might just send a six foot four transgendered person to encourage you along the way just when you need her most.

Cell Phone Slave Declares Freedom

In 1986, I was sitting with an elderly lady of society in New York City when her telephone rang. The telephone was located on the chairside table where she sat. There was no answering machine attached. I asked her if she wanted to take the call fearing she might have thought it impolite to answer while we chatted. (I also admit that the ringing anoyed me but that's another story.)

"I had the telephone installed for my convenience. It is not convenient right now for me to answer it." We waited and the phone stopped ringing.

Flash forward, 1998, I'm sitting in an outdoor cafe in Santa Monica California with my friend Micheleangelo. (Yes there are living people today with that name.) His cell phone rang for the third time during our brief visit and yet again, I wait several minutes, listening to his side of what I consider an inane conversation. I'm getting pretty ticked off. Not only are these people interrupting him but they are interrupting me. I drop some money on the table, pretend to look at my watch and mouth the words, "I gotta go. I'm going to be late" and I cut out.

Flash forward another 9 years, it's 2007 and I am sitting in a Thai restaurant in Pittsburgh, PA. I've been working endlessly on my career, building my work-life balance consulting practice. I'm with my partner Elihu, someone I've barely seen in the last two weeks. Between his work schedule and mine, these moments alone are rare. My cell phone rings. I had been waiting all day for a call from a potential client. As I reach for my cell phone, I feel like I'm outside my body watching the scene unfold. As I pull the cell phone from my pocket, I remeber that society lady and Michelangelo and without looking to see who was calling, I press the button on the side of phone ignoring the call and tossing it back into my pocket.

Elihu asks me why I didn't take the call and I tell him, "You are the most important person in my life. There is no one I want to or need to talk to right now more than you."

The server, who had been waiting to take our order, was stunned. She actually had a tear in her eye. "That is so sweet," she said. Elihu beamed and we had a fantastic meal.

Part of finding bliss and balancing all of the things that go on in our lives is understanding what is and what is not important and when it's important. Think about how often you answer your phone and it isn't anyting important at all. Think how many times you have to stop doing something that is important in order to take a call that is not.

Bliss
Joseph

The Company Holiday Party

There is a blurring of what is and is not appropriate during many office parties. People are loosening up and letting go. The bosses say they want you to have fun but take it from someone who has been to many office parties. Stay on the safe side. You are still at work.

The office party may be free flowing with holiday "spirits" but get drunk on your own time, away from the office. A drink or two, you know your limit, won't hurt but you don't really want to let your hair down all the way. Office relationships have been permanently damaged and people have lost their jobs for things they've said and done while supposedly "off the clock" at the office party. One of my clients once told me of an office party at which, an inebriated young man made a sexual overture toward the CEO's wife! OK, he was drunk. He didn't realize who she was. He didn't realize what he was doing and he probably wouldn't have done that if he were sober. He was still looking for a new job.

Dress appropriately; it's still work! It's nice to get dressed up but save the overtly sexy wear for truly social events. You don't want to be the object of unwelcome attention during the party and you don't want to be the source of all the gossip after.

If you are a manager, you have to go. It's unfortunate but all right for an employee to opt out but if you have supervisory responsibilities, you really should be there. You are, in effect, a host to the people you supervise but you never stop being the leader. You might relax a bit but remember that your behavior and demeanor should reflect the same quality of character you display while on the job. In fact, you still are on the job.

Avoid cliquish behavior. Of course it's natural to want to be with the people you know but you see them all the time. If you really want to spend time with your immediate co-workers, you should do this on your own. The office party is a great time to get to know others in the company a little better. It's also an opportunity to let people see who you are. Make a point of mingling, shaking hands and remembering names. You'll build allies throughout the organization who can make your life and your job easier in ways you cannot imagine.

If you are invited to be someone's guest or you are going to your spouses holiday party, the same rules apply but double. Your goal is to look good, be polite and stand quietly next to your spouse and let him or her make a good impression. You are not there to have a good ime; you are there to accompany the person you care about.

Make sure to extend your mingling to those high level managers and senior managers with whom you don't normally interact. The two most critical elements in getting promoted, getting better assignments and more challenging or interesting projects are having a higher level "sponsor"—that is someone who remembers you and thinks of you as they are discussing assignments and being a respected and well-liked person. The company party is a great time to make a positive impression.