Business
& Career: Know Your Ruling Star!
"Know your
Ruling Star. One man is better received by one nation than another,
or is one welcome by one city than another. He finds more luck in one
office or position than in another, and all though his qualifications
are equal or even identical. Let each man know his luck as well as his
talents. Follow your guiding star and help it without mistaking any
other for it. Know how to transplant yourself. There are nations with
whom one must cross their borders to make one's value felt."
- Balthasar Gracian, (Spain, 1600's)
Have you ever
felt, "Here I am, best job I ever had, good money, an excellent
career move - but, what in the world am I doing here where I feel so
alone and out-of-place with my surroundings? How did this happen to
me?"
I've been there,
because someone offered me a job and I accepted, knowing ahead-of-time,
intuitively I wouldn't feel at home in the town and surroundings.
Or - maybe you
love your location but, sadly, are unable to find any openings in your
field. I've been there also. Looking back on my years in Austin, Texas,
I can't believe the number of short-term, soul-emptying jobs I tried
very hard and unsuccessfully do to. My job-duration ranged from only
two hours (which was long enough when you hate what you are doing!)
to several months (each day seeming like an eternity) before my opportunities
in broadcasting finally came.
It's a rare
person these days who is able to say, "I love this community, love
my home, love the work I do, get along great with my business colleagues
and supervisors. How do you beat perfection?"
There is a wonderful
quote I repeated to myself many, many times during my ups and downs
in Texas.
"Hence
the first principle in changing one's character is to seek another environment,
to let new forces play upon our unused chords, and draw from us a better
music." - Will Durant
That's what
I wanted! I wanted another location - another place - where new forces
could play upon my unused chords and draw from me a better music.
"There
are nations with whom one must cross their borders to make one's value
felt." - Gracian
Yes! Yes! Yes!
That's what I wanted. To cross borders and feel my native talents valued
again.
"Know your
Ruling Star," the Spanish priest Gracian wrote in The Art of Worldly
Wisdom. "One man is better received by one nation than another,
or is one welcome by one city than another. He finds more luck in one
office or position than in another, and all though his qualifications
are equal or even identical."
We are better
received in certain locations or areas than in others, welcomed when
we show up, and we most certainly do find more luck in one place than
another.
"But where,
where, where is THAT PLACE?" I wondered.
In Texas, for
every 100% plus I gave in my career, the returns (feeling valued, appreciated,
and being monetarily rewarded), always fell short.
I hosted a noon
talk show for awhile at an Austin TV station. Our ratings were great.
The guests I booked were top names in the literary, entertainment, self-improvement,
and political arenas.
After our ratings
came in one spring, I couldn't believe how well the show was doing.
Several days
later, however, the General Manager wanted to see me.
After all the
years of my show's success, he said, "James, I can't complain about
your ratings. That's good for ad revenue, but I finally got a chance
to see your show yesterday. As you know I only have a tenth grade education,
never finished high school, started in sales, worked my way up to where
I am today." He beamed proudly, "I didn't understand it."
I knew when
he said, "I didn't understand it," my show was doomed.
The GM was the
standard by which all business decisions at our stations were made.
I wanted to
call him, "Idiot," but restrained myself.
My favorite
line in Texas TV came from a female news director who told me, "You
have a master's degree. We don't need people that smart to do the news."
I never worked at that station.
"Let each
man know his luck as well as his talents. Follow your guiding star and
help it without mistaking any other for it. Know how to transplant yourself,"
Gracian reminds us.
Know how to
transplant yourself!
Finally, I did
transplant myself, once again. It was time to move from the newsroom
and go into teaching; use, finally, that masters degree referred to
earlier that wasn't needed to report the news.
"There
is a simple answer to the question 'What is the purpose of our individual
lives?" A.J. Ayer wrote. "They have whatever purpose we succeed
in putting into them."
Yet, if you
believe you are being guided by and toward a higher destiny, as I do,
use what others know (their gifts and resources) to inform and enlighten
yourself.
I've also successfully
used relocation astrology as an essential tool to follow my guiding
star. Through my sessions with Cait Benten, I'm finding, as we'd all
like to do, a balance of the "right place" and the "right
work" combined.
"This time,
like all other times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do
with it." --Ralph Waldo Emerson
http://www.astro-earth-relocation.com
About The Author
Now, after a
career as an award-winning media communicator and as a university professor,
James has shared meaning-filled conversations with film stars, recording
artists, US Presidents and first ladies, state governors, world-famous
authors, scientists, and people from most every walk of life
|
Powered by>