Someone I highly recommend all high-performing corporate professionals read and study is the great Indian sage Jiddu Krishnamurti.

When he was still alive & kicking, Krishnamurti was widely seen as THE expert on topics like the limits of effort and how the mind creates fear. This is the guy who spent his life “watching” his mind while ignoring the teachings and techniques of his peers. He also ended up publicly binning the guru setup that raised him, but that’s a story for another day.

Still, a fascinating chap.

He’s not the most accessible though. Some of his books merit a long lie down with a cold towel after just a page or two. In fact, I could barely make it through a paragraph of Krishnamurti’s Freedom from the Known as I kicked back on a sun lounger in the South of France last year (the inflatable pink unicorn bobbing up & down in the pool might’ve had something to do with that too...)

Anyway, if you care about your job but feel over-stretched or like work is taking over, his teachings are well worth a look.

Take this zinger from Krishnamurti for instance:

“Here is my secret: I don’t mind what happens”

On first blush, you might think JK (not Rowling) has completely stopped caring.

But he’s not saying that at all.

Take someone who DOES mind what happens at work. These are the people who spend 15 minutes arguing over a single word in an email, who try to clarify situations before anyone is even confused or over-explain decisions that don’t need to be justified. Inevitably they’re the folk who are stressed, tense and under pressure too. And this leaks into life outside work. Their work comes with them wherever they go.

Now take the corporate bods who don’t mind what happens.

These people let small things stay small, see situations as they actually are and channel their energy in the right directions. They also know when something genuinely needs attention and they deal with it cleanly, quickly and without drama - even if they’re running at 100mph, as they will be sometimes. But when work ends, it ends.

There’s nothing uncaring about that as far as I can see.

Which brings us to the nub:

Whether or not you care is missing the point. What matters is whether or not you MIND.

If you link your peace of mind to your outcomes at work, you’ll feel under threat whenever an outcome’s at risk and thus do whatever you can to control those outcomes.

But if you don’t mind, you won’t. If your happiness, self-esteem or sense of fulfilment is not at stake even if (or when) things go belly up at work, you won’t try to bend your job to your agenda. You'll just do what's needed instead.

I know it’s subtle, but I’m sure this is what Krishnamurti’s secret is getting at.

Yes, it’s an inconvenient secret for most corporate folk. There’s no system to implement, no work to delegate and no way to optimise this secret. You can’t use this secret to look busy or virtuous either. 

But if you want to care about your job without it owning you, this is the direction to look in.

As it happens, it’s the exact journey I’ve been on too.

That’s why my coaching is literally built around the idea of caring about your job without it owning you.

If that sounds like something you’d like, all the info’s here:

https://signup.followingfulfilment.com

To fulfilment,

Tom