Is it time for a career change?

How do you know when it’s time for a career change or a career transformation?

It’s no surprise that if you’re in a job you hate, you’ll deal with burnout sooner than later. But when you’re in a job you adore? You can just as easily burn out.

15 years ago I probably had quotes like this pinned on my board:

“Do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.”

Now, 15 years experienced Grace would replace it with, “Do what you love and you usually won’t mind that you’re working your butt off.”

When you love your work, you can become very immersed in it. As a designer you’re always ideating and innovating in your mind. But also being a human being, you need rest.

So back to the question, How do you differentiate between genuine misalignment and burnout when all you know right now is that you hate your job?

A few questions to ask yourself to help provoke self-reflection and hopefully help you clarify whether you have burnout or are truly not where you should be:

1. What is something you can’t not do? This is specific to you and the core of who you are. For example, you might answer that you can’t not be working with your hands, or you can’t not be illustrating, or you can’t not be working with clothes, etc.
2. Do you derive your sense of identity, or purpose, or meaning, from your work? Pause and really reflect here. If so, can you identify what about your current job isn’t validating for you?
3. Was there ever a time when you loved your job? If you answered yes, when was that time? What did you love about it? Why aren’t you doing more of it?

If after the self reflection you realize that you do actually like your job (or what it’s supposed to be) but are just burnt out from:

• resentment of the company because your salary is inadequate, or
• because your design job has been taken over by paperwork and meetings, or
• there are no boundaries that separate your life from work…

Then friend, you are probably in the right career. You just need to take control of it to stop it from controlling your life.

If you’re still working through the self-reflection questions that's totally normal and okay! And if you feel like you need someone to hash through them with, slide into my DMs--I am more than willing to be that person for you.

To your overall happiness in both work and play,

Grace

P.s. Want to find out how you stand out among designers? Take this 45-second quiz and find out what sets you apart, and how to use your unique advantage to grow a successful design career: gracekimportland.com/quiz