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Stop Grinding, Start Thriving: Align Your Work With Your Values

Stop Grinding, Start Thriving: Align Your Work With Your Values

Plus, learn to identify and define your personal values.

Sol TV
February 06, 2025

💡 Are You Working Too Hard?

🚀 TL/DR: Grind Smart

✨ Sol Bites: Steps to Align Hard Work With Your Values

🦋 How to Find Your Personal Values?

📜 Words of Wisdom

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Let's start this off by talking about two types of people you might know. One we’ll call Sam, and he’s a guy who started out wanting to save the planet through environmental law but somehow got sucked into the world of corporate law instead. He totally crushed it as a company lawyer, but after seven years grinding away, he suddenly wondered, "Is this really it?" Then there's someone we’ll call Riley, a woman who so completely bought into the whole "relationships are hard work" thing that she spent 15 years trying to fix a broken marriage while her dreams of being a photographer collected dust.

Both had the exact lightbulb moment: Just because you're working your butt off doesn't mean you're moving in the right direction. They finally decided to shake things up—Sam took a pay cut for a job in environmental law that actually meant something to him, while Riley ditched her dead-end marriage to chase her photography dreams.

When it comes to working hard, think of yourself like a 747 airplane waiting to take off. All that power means nothing if you're heading the wrong direction.

TL/DR: Grind Smart

Hard work is great, but it’s only really valuable when it aligns with your authentic values. Before pouring energy into something, assess whether it truly matters to you, not just others.

Sol Bites: Steps to Align Hard Work With Your Values

Here’s how to consider the benefits and opportunity costs of your efforts:

1. Examine Your Values

- Identify where your current goals came from.

- Question if they are genuinely your values or inherited ones.

- Ask yourself: "Would I choose this path if I were starting fresh today?"

2. Calculate the Opportunity Cost

- List everything you're giving up to pursue this work.

- Consider the time your work takes you away from family, the impact it has on your health, and the opportunities it’s caused you to miss.

- Evaluate if the sacrifices align with your life priorities.

3. Project Out

- Imagine yourself in 10 years if you continue on this path.

- Consider how you'll feel about your efforts looking back.

- Ask yourself if the work will contribute to the life you actually want.

4. Do a Happiness Audit

- Monitor your daily energy levels while you’re working.

- Note which tasks energize you and which ones drain you.

- Track the ratio of fulfillment to exhaustion.

5. Test Your Motivation

- Identify why you're working so hard.

- Distinguish between internal drive and external pressure.

- Question if you're working hard to avoid something else.

6. Assess Impact Alignment

- Evaluate if your work benefits what truly matters to you.

- Consider who benefits from your efforts.

- Measure the gap between effort invested and meaningful outcomes.

The goal isn't to work less but to work hard on the right things. By consciously directing your efforts toward what truly matters to you, hard work becomes productive, deeply satisfying, and worthwhile.