Bill,
I think that the freedom that a person feels to make dramatic changes in
their lives partially relates to the context in which their formative
experience occurred. I've never worked in a large corporation, so I can't
speak to the psychological impact of that structure upon a person. My
guess is, and it is just a guess, is that for many people, they get used
to the "secure(?)" structure, and find it a challenge to think of
themselves a part from it. In fact, it is less the paycheck, than it is
the benefits of pension and hospitalization which ties us tightly to the
structure.
For me, I have worked all my life in either church-related or higher
education settings. These are looser structures which provide for more
individual autonomy, often less feedback/accountability, less money, but
more freedom. When I ventured out to become a "leadership development
consultant", my motivation had to do with being in more control of my
occupational life, and more focused upon goals which I felt I wanted to
achieve, that I couldn't in the context I was in. The business is
growing, and I am having a good time learning to do things which before I
never had the opportunity.
I have been told by others that they think our family was courageous to
have started over. I never thought it as a courageous step, though I see
why people do. It was the natural development of the course of our lives.
It was a natural outgrowth of our own emerging priorities. If there is
courage it was to initially face up to the question of personal values,
and the willingness to act upon them. As for people whom we celebrate as
heroes, for their courage and risk, some of that is our own distant,
detached perspective. I won't go so far as to say hype, but that we endow
them with a personna which may or may not be accurate, but which validate
our own sense of values and worth. They are human beings like both of us,
for whom circumstances provided them an opportunity to test the best of
their character. And in most of those situations, the real heroes are
those who stood by them, and never got the recognition. I'm not cynical
about these people, only about how we make them into people they are not.
For I see that no matter what you do, whether you venture out into the
unknown or stay within a situation which seems secure, that you are
accepting a life of risk. You cannot avoid it. The challenge then is to
develop the resources both personal, occupationally and financially to be
able to take advantage of the risk which is always there. Which is the
greater risk: the death of a person's soul through work they hate, or the
risk of not being able to fund a child's education? I realize this is a
false dicotomy, but never-the-less, often our choice come down to
"self-actualizaton/survival as a human being and the financial.
Thanks for your honesty,
Ed Brenegar
Leadership Resources
brenegar@circle.net
--"Edwin R. Brenegar III" <EdB3@msn.com>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>