Marie Kondo has gained fame for making your living space “sparkle with joy.”
But what if it’s not your space that sparkles with joy, but you, and your face, and your tone, when you work?
It’s hard to describe in words, but there is a look in someone’s eyes when they are deeply engaged in the work they’re doing. You see it. You see it in their eyes when you talk to them about the challenges of the work. You see it when you realize they’re emailing you at all hours. You see it when they go overboard and over-the-top when it’s not needed. You see it when the quality of their work blows away their expectations.
I’d go a step further and say you can’t do great work if you’re not sparkling with joy. You can do “good enough,” for sure. But this series is all about going to the next level.
And while this is unquantifiable, it is among the most important characteristics for your boss or client. They are human and they too want to work and be surrounded by people who are sparkling with joy at the work itself. They don’t want to be a taskmaster. They don’t want to be surrounded by the drudgery themselves!
If you have that sparkle in your eye, great, you’ve done the hard part. Internalizing the tips here and practicing them is much easier than making your eyes glitter with giddy emotion.
If you don’t have that sparkle in your eye, then it’s time to ask yourself some hard questions.
Are you doing what you love? If not, why not?
If you love the theoretical subject, but not the daily work (“I love writing” vs. “being a journalist for my local newspaper is miserable”) then why are you doing this work at all to make money as compared to a passion project on the side?
If the work environment is stopping your sparkle, what is it about the work environment? Can it change?
Are your standards even achievable in this world full of mortals? If no work makes you sparkle with joy, could it be that you have a definition of sparkle with joy that makes it unattainable, at least in a work context?
A useful rule I follow is to always remind myself that in life, to sparkle with joy or even just to be happy, there are really only two inputs: reality, and my preferences. And changing reality is really, really, really hard—usually impossible. So perhaps it’s time to change your preferences?
