Zen and the Art of Making a Living: A Practical Guide to Creative Career Design

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Zen and the Art of Making a Living has been, for many years, a treasured and often referred to addition to my very selective library. It is that rare combination of the inspirational and the practical." To be authentic, the play or action of your life must come from within, must flow from your heart. The spiritual or inner life cannot be separated from work - or anything else.

First and foremost, give yourself a chance to be the one of those, whose intentions are widely presented. Honesty is the embodiment of happiness, a quote that should stay in your recollection. In today's job market, the question has become not Can I find a job? but Can I find a job I like? Laurence G. Boldt answers this question with a resounding yes in Zen and the Art of Making a Living: A Practical Guide to Creative Career Design. For over three decades, author Laurence Boldt, has been helping people to live their dreams, through his work as a writer, speaker, and career consultant. He is the founder of EmpowerYOU.com and author of five books, including the bestselling career classic Zen and the Art of Making a Living. This groundbreaking work has been credited by many with revolutionizing the career field, offering a new a vision of work and a new technology of vocational guidance. Boldt's other books include the bestselling How to Find the Work You Love, The Tao of Abundance, Zen Soup and How to Be, Do or Have Anything.It's hard to imagine that Boldt has forgotten anything in this massive, unconventional volume. He shows a strong understanding of the need for a new view of work in Western cultures. "So often today, white-collar workers are hired for their brains alone, blue-collar and service workers for their bodies only, as though these could be detached from the beings who possess them," he writes. "As a consequence, there is so much emotional pain around work in our culture. This pain spills over into virtually every aspect of life. Families, relationships, and communities are deeply affected by it. We can't really blame anyone for this, or at least, it does us no good to do so. Freedom can't be demanded from others—it must be created for ourselves." In my late 20s, I got partway through the very extensive writing and reflecting that this workbook calls for, and that's it. There's only so much soul-searching that I can do. I have been a Career Counselor . . . for the past ten years. In all of this time, I have not found a book that is as effective and well-rounded. . . . Your book has become a fixture in my career center. But beyond its appeal to me, I think it finally takes career education in the many directions necessary to establish, not only one's identity, but an assessment of what makes work meaningful to an individual. Few, if any, texts I've worked with in the past have accomplished this."

We fear change. "Yet it's not knowing what's coming around the corner that makes life interesting." For good thoughts... towards men, are little better than dreams, except they be put into action; and that cannot be, without power and place." -- Francis Bacon The best answers come from the heart, not the head.To play the game, you must understand the rules.Peace comes from within, not from other people.Wait for the perfect time to make a change and you'll wait forever.Fear of failure can stand in the way of your dreams.Until you find what you love, love what you do.Giving up is not an option. All great teachers say that the road to happiness begins with the recognition "that beyond the transient desires of ego there lie deeper desires for love and service to all mankind." Most of us don't go this route because we "are too busy running down approval alley." We try to please others, and pleasing is calculated while "compassion comes from the heart."Thousands of so-called ordinary people are every day involved in heroic service to their fellow man. Most of this service goes unrecognized and unnoticed by the wider public because it does not fit with the conventional view of what is valuable or important."