ZekeArtZ

Reading Alexander Kjerulf’s book 3 times made me feel like I’m on the verge of a breakthrough. Each time I read his book made me feel like this in his introduction.

Happy at work.

Happy? At work?

Happy… at work?

I really did wonder if it was possible to be truly happy at work in my own personal work situation. When I started reading, the idea of being happy at work sounded like another “be positive and everything will be fine” concept. While I agree that having a positive attitude plays a vital role, it is always easier said than done. When I started reading, I picked out the easiest and most practical things I could do at my work place. Check out chapter 2 on “What makes us happy at work?” and chapter 9 on “How to make yourself happy at work” for some ideas on how you can begin making a change.

Here’s a brief idea of what things were like before I read Happy Hour is 9 to 5. I work as a Flash programmer at an ad agency that has great benefits and pays really well. I say that because as far as I know, what I earn is easily 20-30% above market rate. I work with an amazing group of colleagues who are talented and passionate about what they do… and the results we produce are just astounding. They are the nicest people I know and always willing to lend a helping hand when needed. My role there is solely as an Actionscript programmer while doing a little bit of design and animation occasionally. However, about 6 months into my present job, I found that I was no longer happy with what I was doing. I thought something must be wrong with the company or my environment. So I started looking for faults and problems… thinking if I knew what was wrong, I could avoid it. The result? I was less unhappy… but I was neither getting happier nor improving my situation. This was clearly in alignment with Alex’s thinking about how happiness is something you need to do and constantly work at. Avoiding situations or tasks that make you unhappy doesn’t work… I’ve tried it and I know better now.

I was desperately seeking answers to improve my situation and came across Happy Hour is 9 to 5. After my first read, the first step I took was learning to be positive. I’m not a naturally positive person ( my wife can testify to that )… so the first step was definitely not that easy for me. I started by being thankful for what I currently had… a good paying job, nice colleagues, and very understanding bosses. I reminded myself to be thankful each day before and after work. Amazingly, things seemed to change gradually. I didn’t notice it but I was starting to feel happy before my work day started. What was interesting was that my work was also starting to improve. My efficiency improved and I got my work done faster than usual.

While feeling the excitement that things were improving, I moved on to step 2 which is to learn. While thinking about what I wanted to learn I discovered that I preferred to learn something other than programming. So I came up with a list of things I would love to learn in 2008. From learning to draw to watching training videos to reading books, I invested as much time as I to learn something each day. I found that I was more energised and felt happier after I had taken time to learn something I was genuinely interested in. So I spend my best hours learning new things and I had fun doing so. Of course, my priority was still my job and I would ensure things were still done in due time. Ok, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. I’ll share more about my experience on this new journey in my future post.