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CAREER
Business
& Career: Know Your Ruling Star!
"Know your Ruling Star. One man is better received by
one nation than another, or is one welcome by one city
than another. He finds more luck in one office or
position than in another, and all though his
qualifications are equal or even identical. Let each man
know his luck as well as his talents. Follow your
guiding star and help it without mistaking any other for
it. Know how to transplant yourself. There are nations
with whom one must cross their borders to make one's
value felt."
- Balthasar Gracian, (Spain, 1600's)
Have you ever felt, "Here I am, best job I ever had,
good money, an excellent career move - but, what in the
world am I doing here where I feel so alone and
out-of-place with my surroundings? How did this happen
to me?"
I've been there, because someone offered me a job and I
accepted, knowing ahead-of-time, intuitively I wouldn't
feel at home in the town and surroundings.
Or - maybe you love your location but, sadly, are unable
to find any openings in your field. I've been there
also. Looking back on my years in Austin, Texas, I can't
believe the number of short-term, soul-emptying jobs I
tried very hard and unsuccessfully do to. My
job-duration ranged from only two hours (which was long
enough when you hate what you are doing!) to several
months (each day seeming like an eternity) before my
opportunities in broadcasting finally came.
It's a rare person these days who is able to say, "I
love this community, love my home, love the work I do,
get along great with my business colleagues and
supervisors. How do you beat perfection?"
There is a wonderful quote I repeated to myself many,
many times during my ups and downs in Texas.
"Hence the first principle in changing one's character
is to seek another environment, to let new forces play
upon our unused chords, and draw from us a better
music." - Will Durant
That's what I wanted! I wanted another location -
another place - where new forces could play upon my
unused chords and draw from me a better music.
"There are nations with whom one must cross their
borders to make one's value felt." - Gracian
Yes! Yes! Yes! That's what I wanted. To cross borders
and feel my native talents valued again.
"Know your Ruling Star," the Spanish priest Gracian
wrote in The Art of Worldly Wisdom. "One man is better
received by one nation than another, or is one welcome
by one city than another. He finds more luck in one
office or position than in another, and all though his
qualifications are equal or even identical."
We are better received in certain locations or areas
than in others, welcomed when we show up, and we most
certainly do find more luck in one place than another.
"But where, where, where is THAT PLACE?" I wondered.
In Texas, for every 100% plus I gave in my career, the
returns (feeling valued, appreciated, and being
monetarily rewarded), always fell short.
I hosted a noon talk show for awhile at an Austin TV
station. Our ratings were great. The guests I booked
were top names in the literary, entertainment,
self-improvement, and political arenas.
After our ratings came in one spring, I couldn't believe
how well the show was doing.
Several days later, however, the General Manager wanted
to see me.
After all the years of my show's success, he said,
"James, I can't complain about your ratings. That's good
for ad revenue, but I finally got a chance to see your
show yesterday. As you know I only have a tenth grade
education, never finished high school, started in sales,
worked my way up to where I am today." He beamed
proudly, "I didn't understand it."
I knew when he said, "I didn't understand it," my show
was doomed.
The GM was the standard by which all business decisions
at our stations were made.
I wanted to call him, "Idiot," but restrained myself.
My favorite line in Texas TV came from a female news
director who told me, "You have a master's degree. We
don't need people that smart to do the news." I never
worked at that station.
"Let each man know his luck as well as his talents.
Follow your guiding star and help it without mistaking
any other for it. Know how to transplant yourself,"
Gracian reminds us.
Know how to transplant yourself!
Finally, I did transplant myself, once again. It was
time to move from the newsroom and go into teaching;
use, finally, that masters degree referred to earlier
that wasn't needed to report the news.
"There is a simple answer to the question 'What is the
purpose of our individual lives?" A.J. Ayer wrote. "They
have whatever purpose we succeed in putting into them."
Yet, if you believe you are being guided by and toward a
higher destiny, as I do, use what others know (their
gifts and resources) to inform and enlighten yourself.
I've also successfully used relocation astrology as an
essential tool to follow my guiding star. Through my
sessions with Cait Benten, I'm finding, as we'd all like
to do, a balance of the "right place" and the "right
work" combined.
"This time, like all other times, is a very good one, if
we but know what to do with it."
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