Houchin Consulting PLLC
Here’s the video from my Ignite Fort Collins #7 talk. It comes down to this: Wisdom is only found when we share a combined experience with a mutually understood language. Those languages can be in any form, written, spoken, symbolic, etc. Engage the experience. Learn the language. Share the Wisdom.
Take a look a the other great Ignite Fort Collins talks while you’re on the site.
Do you enjoy your work as a lawyer?
Do you have the balanced life you were hoping for?
Do you get to spend enough time with your family or doing the things that feed your spirit?
Do you know that you can pay your bills next month? How about next year?
Have you always wished you could start your own law practice, but the fear of financial insecurity keeps you in a “J-O-B” that is steeling your life?
Have you already started your practice, but feel stupid asking for help?
If a solution to these questions was given to you, would you take action?
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There was once a very smart young leader. This leader was always top of the class in High School. She was also the natural leader outside the classroom, excelling in extra-curricular activities. She was passionate about everything she did, confident, and secure in the knowledge of her successful future.
When she went to college it became a bit more challenging, but she still fell into natural leadership roles and achieved results that her classmates envied. She had always known she was going to be some sort of “professional,” but in college, it became pretty clear that law school might be in her future. After graduation, she worked a few jobs, but none gave her the challenge she craved. She got bored. She also found a few things in the world that she wanted to change and making those changes just felt “right.” She wasn’t conscious that addressing those issues was her life path, but the passion was kindled again and she decided that law school would be the next step toward reaching her goals. She ALWAYS reached her goals, so she applied, and was accepted to a highly respected law school.
She realized on the first day of law school that things were different. This wasn’t going to be an easy ride to the top. Her classmates were very smart, some younger, some older, but all used to high achievement. She didn’t know what to think, so she didn’t notice when the culture started thinking for her.
She didn’t notice when her inner definition of success changed to a definition that included making the staff of the Law Review, competing for summer internships, receiving grades in the top 10% of her class and ultimately landing a job with a large firm in a major city with a six-figure salary. She didn’t notice when her understanding of her life balance and drive to help people make their lives better was replaced with these other measures – that was “normal” in law school. She didn’t notice when her ability to engage her heart and conscience was replaced by “thinking like a lawyer.” Those changes too, were “normal” in law school.
She spent summers in “top” internships where she learned that the competition had only just begun, and got a small glimpse into the amount commitment a partnership track associate had to give to the firm. She also saw the toys they were able to buy with the salary (which they never seemed to have time to enjoy), and whenever she saw her law school debt statements she decided that she HAD to have that salary, no matter what.
She made the law review, and while she generally enjoyed the people she spent time with, the work itself seemed tedious and unimportant in the context of that fading dream of changing the world in her particular way. Again, this was just “normal” for law school.
She graduated in the top 10% of her class. She got an offer from the firm she had worked with the summer between 2L and 3L. The job offer wasn’t in an area of law that had anything to do with her dream, but it paid well, was prestigious, and she needed the money to pay off her school loans. Her parents were very happy for her. Her old friends respected her. She felt smart.
When she started as the new associate in the big firm, she discovered the realities of minimum billing. She discovered the drudgery that can come with law practice. She felt smart, but unfulfilled – like something was missing in her life. She had good money for the first time in her life, so when she felt hollow, she went shopping. The toys were nice, but they didn’t fill that hole inside her. She volunteered (with what little time she could give – she had to work weekends to make the billable hour minimums after all, and she also wanted to get ahead and make partner someday), but it still didn’t fill that void.
She was smart and worked hard, so after a few years, she was well respected in a field of law that had nothing to do with her dream, but there were now law students that knew more about the legal issues in that other area than she did now.
Now she was an expert…
In a field she didn’t enjoy…
Working all the time…
To pay for a lifestyle…
That she developed to fill the void…
Of being an expert…
In a field she didn’t enjoy…
Working all the time…
She was trapped.
She didn’t know what to do and felt stupid asking for help. She saw her peers drinking too much, or taking on worse habits to take the edge of the cycle of pain they had created in their lives. She hadn’t developed those habits, but could see the motivation. She wasn’t sleeping well. Something needed to change.
She had to find the place back to that purpose in her life that motivated her to go to law school in the first place.
But how?
She was scared she would be seen as a failure.
She was scared she would not make enough money.
But she was more scared that she was literally selling the days of her life to her firm, without living her purpose.
The fear of wasting her life was terrifying, far bigger than the fear of failure or not having a six figure income immediately.
So, she resolved to take action and get her life back on purpose…
She left the big firm and started her own practice. She wanted to empower others to reach their entrepreneurial dreams because she believed that inside every human was some creative gift they could give to the world. She new that many entrepreneurs would benefit from her experience and find the confidence THEY needed to pursue their dreams because she was willing to share her mistakes with them. After all, the fear of asking for help is human nature when there’s a little bit of shame attached. Shame of not knowing. Shame from getting into “dumb” situations. Shame of making mistakes. She had experienced those things, and if it could happen to this smart, over-achieving lawyer, it could happen to anyone.
Her solo practice was growing, but she was still worried. The business model of the legal industry said that you had to bill people a lot of money, by the hour, or by the project. Many of her small business clients were bootstrapping start-ups and honestly couldn’t afford to pay “the going rate.”
Each month was a struggle. She never knew where the billing would start in the next month, let alone end up, so she couldn’t bring herself to hire even a part time assistant because she didn’t want to have to lay someone off. She couldn’t focus on the systems to deliver her best work, because she had to deal with all the mundane details of running the business. She had a hard time actually billing more than a few hours a day, and some days getting even a couple billable hours in didn’t happen until after her kids and husband were asleep. She would have a great month of billable work, only to find that she hadn’t had time to market and bring in work for the next month. She called that the cash-flow roller-coaster, and she hated it.
Again, she was trapped.
This time, she wasn’t trapped by the big firm. She didn’t know who to blame. This was how the law business worked, wasn’t it?
There had to be a better way.
There had to be a way to create predictable income.
There had to be a way to serve clients better.
There had to be a way to focus on what she loved.
There had to be a way to spend more quality time with the people she loved.
There had to be a way to hire the help she needed.
There had to be other people in the same situation.
There had to be someone who knew how to help her, without making her feel like a failure.
Well, there is. And maybe YOU can be a part of that group.
Do you want to get your life back on purpose?
Do you want to better serve your small business clients?
Do you want to spend more quality time with the people you love?
If you answered Yes to any of these questions, then you owe it to yourself, your family, and your clients to listen to the replay of the call I co-hosted with my friend Ben Glass last week.
My name is Kevin Houchin, and I founded The Space Between Center for Creative Spirit in Business to help other small business lawyers discover the literally life-changing methods and mind-sets that I’ve learned since discovering how to get my life back on purpose, better serve my clients, spend more time with my family, and integrate my lifestyle with my career.
If you want to take action and change your life for the better, join us on the call and see if membership in the Space Between Center Lawyer Mastermind Program might be for you. If you think so, but don’t take action now, then you’re probably not a good fit for the program anyway – it’s only for those ready to take action. If you think so and take action, then you may very well be on the right path.
Go listen to the call replay now.
It’ll be worth your time.
It might even change your life.
Now, back to work…
Today is the first Sunday of Advent. This is the beginning of the season where we of the Western tradition begin to reflect and celebrate the light (wisdom, power, spirit) of the divine being manifested in humans. A few years ago I felt inspired to write an essay on the topic of Advent and Christmas, and that calling happened again today on the related topic of recognizing one’s life purpose(s).
As many of you know I’m a big fan of social media, especially Twitter.com (@kevinhouchin) and Facebook (Kevin E. Houchin). I recently posted the following and received a couple responses that motivated me to start writing.
The question about HOW to recognize purpose is a question that a lot of people have. While I don’t profess to have THE answer, I think I have AN answer–one that I’ve shared in my Fuel the Spark books, in my workshops, seminars, and keynotes, and will definitely share again in my next book: The Secrets of Creative Business. But I don’t want you to have to wait or have to pay for this, because sharing this information is at the heart of MY purpose on the planet.
First, and this is VERY important, understand that you are not searching for your purpose, instead, the goal is to recognize your purpose. Searching for your purpose will lead you to failure every time, because by searching, you are looking outside yourself to find something that’s already inside you. If you search outside yourself, you’ll be fooled into accepting what other people think your purpose should be as what your purpose really is.
Second, know that you probably have more than one purpose, or at least more than one way to manifest that purpose in the world. Properly stated, your purpose will never be “completed” but you will always be in the process of fulfilling the purpose without “failure.” Many times, if you feel that you have more than one purpose, each purpose you state will be related in some form to a higher purpose that you have not yet recognized and articulated. I’ll give you an example and then we’ll move on to why recognizing your purpose has become so difficult.
I created my purpose statement using the tools and structure from the book Inspire: What Great Leaders Do by Lance Secretan. (No, I don’t have an affiliate relationship with Lance.) This is one of my favorite books ever and one I think everyone should read. My kids will be required to read this as soon as I think they can understand what’s being discussed and I’ll probably read it out loud to them well before they can read it on their own. Lance breaks purpose down into three statements: Destiny, Cause, and Calling. Here are mine:
This essay is a step toward fulfilling my purpose on the planet. My law practice, where I help people find ways to make their living through creative business (sharing their spark of divinity) is another. My books and speaking events are a literal calling to help people understand these concepts and then have the tools to act on what they’ve recognized in themselves. In a quite moment last night I literally heard my little voice say I needed to write this essay for my friends Terri and Marla who commented on Facebook, and share the essay with the world via my blog. I know my purpose. Now let’s get back to recognizing yours.
Understand that it’s not your fault if you can’t articulate your purpose yet, because it’s not something we’re taught in Western culture. In fact, our entire culture seems to be structured around obscuring your purpose or providing you with all kinds of false paths. This isn’t done intentionally. Most of the people providing these false paths to nowhere do it out of love and pure intention, but as we’ve discussed, anything coming from outside yourself is going to be a false path. Most of the time, these folks who are trying to help you find your purpose really have no sense of their own which means this isn’t really their fault either.
Your parents provided purpose in your life. They sent you to school, they taught by example, they taught by providing positive and negative feedback for your actions. Many of us discuss what we want to be when we grow up with our parents and sometimes our parents do far too much to drive that decision down a path that THEY define as “success” or “security” out of love for you and sometimes out of a desire to reach some unrecognized or unfulfilled purpose of their own.
If you were lucky enough to have some great teachers in your life, they probably exhibited some examples of purpose for you. How many people wanted to grow to be like one of their teachers or coaches? While at school, you find friends and those friends help shape your dreams, goals, and definitions of success – for better or worse. After school, you go to work and the culture of the job or company shapes your purpose.
The religion of your parents, friends, and nation also shapes your definition of life purpose, usually with a moral undertone, but again as an influence from outside. How many times has religion been used as a tool to bend people’s purposes from what is inside them to what is willed from behind the pulpit. No religion is exempt from these examples and I believe that most of the time the outside influence is delivered with the purest of intentions. But none of these influences will guide you to your true life purpose, because your purpose can’t be FOUND because it’s not LOST. It’s inside you right now. All you need to do is recognize, accept, and surrender.
I’m about to share with you the most powerful (yet simple) tool and process for recognizing your life’s purpose that I’ve found, and I’ve been working on this for YEARS. But first you have to be in a state to use the tool. This process can be used in your personal life, your career, or even at a business planning level. To make it work, you have to be able to get quiet.
Western culture doesn’t like people to be quiet. We’re bombarded with stuff every second. I do workshops and ask the attendees to just sit quietly and look at a dot on the wall for just one minute. To a person all of them think it’s the longest 60 seconds they’ve ever spent. We are taught to multi-task. We are taught to be on the go all the time. We are not taught to just be. We are not taught how to find the space between thoughts, but it’s in the space between that we find the place where God, the Universe, Spirit, Zero Point Field, or whatever you call the higher power can speak to us in a language we understand. It’s there right now trying to help you recognize your purpose. The tool I’m about to share can help you find the space between thoughts and get quiet enough to recognize why you’re on the planet. Nobody can do this for you.
This process is not about searching, but it does involve some work, focus and commitment. It’s not hard, and if done right is actually fun, fulfilling, instantly and permanently rewarding. Are you ready to start?
Good.
It starts with this quote from an incredible book called The Universal Traveler:
The most profound choice in life is either to accept things as they exist or to accept the personal responsibility for changing them.
What does that quote have to do with life purpose? EVERYTHING.
Your life purpose is simply the thing you accept personal responsibility to change.
It really is that simple, because when you’ve truly accepted the personal responsibility to change something in the world, your path unfolds with opportunities for inspired action and your life will never be the same. Everything you do will be moving you toward the goal of fulfilling the responsibility you have accepted and if something doesn’t move you toward that change you either won’t do it for long or you won’t do it at all.
The work is figuring out where you TRULY and DEEPLY ACCEPT the PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY to CHANGE something.
There are plenty of problems in the world that need solved. There are plenty of things that need changed. What are you going to accept as your problem or problems to solve?
What can you NOT live with as it exists?
I can’t live with people going through life in ignorance of the spark of divinity that lives inside them. I can’t stomach people living lives of quiet desperation working in a cubical at a job they hate waiting to have fun only on the weekends because they don’t know how to start their own businesses doing what they love. So, I became a Creative Business Lawyer, started this blog, and have been writing in an effort to change that situation.
I can’t stand how law school takes our brightest, most idealistic young people and beats the creativity and idealism out of them, redefining the definition of success into a trap of top 10% and six-figure salaries doing work they hate and feeding a lifestyle of internal and external conflict. So, I try to help change law schools through helping law school administrators better define their branding, and wrote a book to help law students stay balanced in the face of this 3-year+ hazing ritual. Finally, I wrote a book to help practicing attorneys recognize the trap they may be in and find a way out in order to truly use their passion and skill to manifest their purpose in life.
What can YOU not live with as is?
When you answer that question in the sincerity of your heart and soul, you’ve taken the most profound step toward recognizing your purpose(s) in life because all you have to do is flip the statement around.
Your purpose in life is to change the thing(s) that you can’t live with as they exist.
It’s just that simple. And that difficult.
When you’ve found the quiet place to do this work, it will come to you. You will recognize your purpose. You will be inspired to act in authenticity in every element of your being and every moment of every day.
I could expand on this quite a bit – and in fact, I will. IMPLEMENTING this work is at the core of my next book, The Secrets of Creative Business. When you know your purpose, it will be time to act and I believe at a soul-level that the best way to implement one’s purpose in life is through founding and building one’s own busines and aligning one’s VOCATION with one’s Purpose and AVOCATION.
Recognize your purpose. Accept the personal responsibility. Surrender to that path and you will find more power than you’ve ever imagined you could wield.
Recognize Your Spark. Share Your flame.
By Kevin E. Houchin
You’re full of it! You really are. There’s no way that I’m the first person to tell you. You can’t deny it. You’re full of it up to your eyebrows.
Full of creativity. You were born with it. You are made of wonderful, delicious, colorful, smelly, heaping globs of creativity!
As a child, your humanity burned with the divine spirit of creativity. You imagined games. You imagined friends. And, you even created vivid experiences that existed only in your mind but existed nonetheless.
Then, you went to school.
You learned to live by other peoples’ rules and their ideas of how and what you “should” be. Walls grew that blocked your view of those wonderful places in your imagination. Those walls grew until finally the creativity of your heart, spirit, and right brain were all but abandoned in favor of subjects that could be objectively tested with multiple-choice exams and computer-graded bubble sheets.
Then, you went to law school.
Your walls were adorned with thorns and you were not even allowed to have ideas of your own. Any creativity you were allowed to display was carefully disguised as nuanced synthesis of precedent (other people’s ideas—the older and less original the better).
It felt like you had suddenly become unworthy of being the source of an idea or thought. You felt like a slave to a footnote or maybe like a footnote yourself.
But, you’re not in law school anymore. Now, you’re the only “source” that really matters. Your senior partner may determine your job status and salary, but you get to decide how much credibility to give those things.
If you’re feeling trapped in a job that doesn’t allow you to express your creativity, you have the power to change that. You don’t have to leave your job to feel more fulfilled. Rather, start chopping through the thorns and breaking down the walls that decades of education have placed around your creative spirit. Trust me, you can do this and still be an effective lawyer. It may even be the secret prerequisite to a happy and satisfied life in the law.
There’s no simple seven-step process to recovering your creative spirit. The journey is different for each of us. A simple start is to look for creative opportunities that already surround you. You happen to be holding one of them in your hand. This issue of The Young Lawyer is dedicated to helping lawyers recognize opportunities for expressing creativity in their lives and work. Use it to jumpstart ideas for creative outlets that you would enjoy. Paint, play music, sail, climb, write, spend time with family, do community service, sing—do something other than work.
It’s time to start living a more creative life. Read these articles. Fuel your spark of creativity, and then share your flame. You’re full of it!
Every once in a while you have a quick email conversation with someone that pays dividends in a currency far more valuable than money. This is one of those situations.
http://loilaing.posterous.com/life-as-a-jigsaw-puzzle
This essay is something for everyone to think about. It’s about being everything you are – all at once.
Thank you Loi-Natalie. 🙂