The Real Job takes over this week - but it still applies!

oops. Did I say we were launching www.pamakana.com on June 1st? What I REALLY meant to say was July 4th (ish). Sorry about that! We do have a pretty new banner on the sign up page though - progress!!

The best part about trying to start a company when everyone works 'real' (paying) full time jobs is that time lines are harder to meet. Especially when things ramp up at work and the time you carved out to spend on your side project (you know, that little thing to change the world?) is now taken up with work stuff because there are only so many hours in the day!

I am learning a lot though - finding the fun, the joy, the happy I had not previously noticed, in topics, situations, and my work. It's incredibly freeing to not hate your job (any of them). I know that starting a company is hard and I want to enjoy it. I figure if I can figure out how to enjoy my 'real' job on days (weeks?) when it is really hard - that's actually pretty darn helpful!

So many people complain for the sake of complaining. I get so tired of hearing 'this is soooo annoying, can you believe it? ugh this place'. What's amazing is when I start asking questions...

• "How do you think it should be done instead?"
• "What ideas do you have for a better process?"
• "What's the background, why do we do it this way today?"
• "Does it still make sense to do it this way?"
• (and so on)

Even by just changing the tone of a random conversation helps change my general mood which seems to settle those around me! I realized this week that I really enjoy looking at situations holistically and trying to figure out a solution or at least an alternate way of doing things. Even if it doesn't happen, it's energizing to give myself and others permission to talk about it! How can anything change if the ideas aren't even discussed? Eventually, a new perspective emerges and it's exciting to witness the change around me. And it's a big company, change is slow and long and involves a LOT of proving that it will work, reporting out that it is working (or not and asking for help), and in order to do all of that - I really need to be open minded and look at the various options.

AND I am able to apply all of these principles and actions to whatever career or entrepreneurial venture I take on. That's possibly the best part of a REALLY hard week - looking back and realizing how much I have learned in such a short period of time!

That and sleep - adequate sleep helps with perspective ;)

What did you learn this week?