Self awareness

How to Stop Thinking about Work – 5 Tips

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How to Stop thinking about work

It is critical to your mental and physical health to know How to Stop Thinking about Work.  This post is written for my benefit and yours, if you find yourself in a similar situation.

During the last six weeks, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about work.   I love my new job, and theoretically I am only working about 40 hours a week,  8:30 am to about 5:30pm, Monday through Friday.  I don’t take my computer home, and I only look at my work phone at home to check on my meeting schedule for the next day. ...  read more

Mid Career Change – 4 Tips on How to Do it

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career change at 40

Making a mid career change, a career change around the age of 40 or 45, is a courageous decision. It is possible for anyone in their mid-life to do this, as long as they understand the trade-offs involved.

Below is a great question I received from a reader who is considering a mid career change, and 4 tips I had for her that would make this change possible. ...  read more

Achieving Work Life Balance – A Letter to Myself

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achieving work life balance

Achieving work life balance takes self-awareness, making tough choices, and being disciplined.  As a recovering over-achiever and perfectionist, this is hard for me.     My natural tendency with any job is to err on the side of working over-time and prioritizing my job above anything else.   The only reason I was able to maintain a healthy work life balance for the last six years was by contracting instead of working as a full time employee.  Being paid by the hour reminded me constantly to stay un-attached and avoid over-working. ...  read more

Lei’s 2013 Experiences

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Lei 2013

Every year seem to go by faster and faster. Do you feel that too?  Well, it’s New Year’s Eve Day and it’s time to look back and take stock of what happened in 2013.  It’s my way to slow down today and be grateful for 2013.

At the beginning of this year, I decided to make 2013 about experiences instead of goals.  Now I can look back and appreciate all the new and challenging experiences I had this year.  Some are big and some are small.  All of them taught me something new.    As you will see, it’s a work in progress for many experiences.   Life is about the journey and not the destination, right? ...  read more

Soft Skills – Note to Self: Shut Up and Take Action

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It is New Year’s Eve day.  I am supposed to be happy and excited.  Instead I wake up very agitated.  My mind is teeming with negative thoughts.  I have been sick for two weeks.  I feel behind.  I feel unaccomplished. I feel tired even though I just got a full night’s sleep.

Then I catch myself.  I realize that, because I have not done much for my soft skills blog lately, the voice in my head is scolding me.  Negative thoughts fill my mind.  I feel deflated.  These feelings had been building up for a few days already. I knew I had to do something to break this pattern.  Instead of letting my negative thoughts control me, I decided to go for a run and de-stress a little. ...  read more

How to Stop Lack of Confidence

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A reader recently asked, via email, “How can one make up for a lack of self-confidence?  How do I beat this nasty character flaw?” Having self-confidence is integral to building Inner Excellence, so I thought this would be a good time to address this question.

First, let me start by telling you a story: ...  read more

How to Make a Change in Yourself at Work

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We have been talking a lot about the different soft skills we need to accelerate our career success, including self-management skills, which are needed to build inner excellence (like patience, persistence, confidence), and people skills (like communication skills, managing people skills, etc.).  Well, one thing is common between all of these topics: in order to master any of these skills, we need to make changes in our behaviors at work. ...  read more