Have you ever felt stuck in your career?  Employee stress and burnout can account for a lot of dissatisfaction in the lives of workers, after all, most individuals are at work for around 8 hours a day or more.  That’s 1/3 of your day.  Now that’s a long time to be dissatisfied!

If you feel stuck, here are 6 great ways to find your ideal career:

1. Brainstorm on a sheet of paper – Take a pad of paper and write down at the top your objective in question form.  Then, simply list out 20 answers to your question.  For example, you could write “What should I be doing with my time and life?”  Then sit down for a while coming up with answers to that question.  The key to this exercise is coming up with 20 answers – don’t quit until you have 20 answers.  You can repeat every day until you get the answer you seek. 
2. Ask three close friends (or your siblings) – Sometimes our friends know us better than we know ourselves.  While meeting with one of your friends, mention you are at a crossroads in your life and career.  Ask what they think you’d enjoy doing.  You might be surprised at how easily they can zero in on your strengths and abilities and report a perfect job area.
3. If you work, ask your co-workers – much like your friends in the example above, your co-workers most likely see you in a way you do not see yourself.  In fact, they are likely most familiar with your strengths and weaknesses in the work environment.  Compile all the answers you get from them and see if there are any common threads you can explore.
4. Take a career assessment test – There are several sites on the web where you can take these for free, others you might need to pay a fee. They ask you to answer a series of questions about what you are good at, what you like to do, and what you prefer doing over what you don’t.  If you take one, you will likely see some new exciting areas to explore in your life.
5. Keep a journal – Do you keep a journal?  If so, read through, looking for common threads in your writing.  Keep your eyes peeled for trends and activities you like as well as don’t like.  In fact, finding examples of what you don’t like and what frustrates you is almost as important as finding what you do like.  For example, if you hate interacting with co-workers you’d probably prefer to work on your own and not in a team. 

Discovering what you really want to do with your life is the most important decision you can make.  As I stated, we spend 1/3 or more of our lives at work so figuring out the right career is important to keeping that 1/3 of our lives are happy and productive.

Speak to your friends, what careers have they suggested for you, and are you surprised at their suggestions? What about your parents or siblings, what careers did they suggest? Do you think you’ll consider these suggestions? Let us know in the comments below!