I have a graduate degree in psychology and I have always been interested in individual human behavior, as well as social and cultural issues. As part of my own educational, emotional and spiritual process, I went through a period of evaluating my values. I found the source of my values mostly to be from my Catholic Church indoctrination, as well as the Judeo-Christian origins of the public school system (I wrote three chapters of a doctoral dissertation on this subject - never to finish - but the point is don't get me started on the subject of public schools!) But I digress . . .
In evaluating my values (I like the synchronicity of that phrase), I went through a period of abandoning everything I had been taught, and then slowly adding values back in as they met my own personal test for inclusion. It was a very slow and painful process (painful because quite a bit of my former identity was tied up in the values I had to let go of and that left me feeling quite unmoored and adrift for awhile).
After graduate school I launched a Feng Shui business, but I was seriously undercapitalized and didn't realize how much promotion it would take to make the business successful. That is when I segued into real estate. I had an underwriting and marketing background, so it seemed a quite natural transition.
But practicing real estate is not for the faint of heart! It is extremely demanding in every way imaginable - you have to have very tough skin. Dealing with other people's emotions is no easy task, not to mention your own when it appears a deal you worked hard on is going sideways. It's very easy to get uncentered. I have to constantly monitor my work habits, as well as my personal habits. The shortage of time is a huge challenge.
One of my goals when I did my "value reevaluation" was to have more balance in my life, and I have to say that that is a goal that so far is always out of reach. That is why I am even thinking about this subject at this point.
One of the challenges in real estate is doing activities without knowing the payoff - in other words, you have to get out there and do floor time, do open houses, door knock, blog, or whatever prospecting system works best for you with your personality. While you are doing it, you don't know ahead of time if it is going to be productive. Lots of times, the specific activities are not productive (no one calls on floor time, no one shows up at an open house) so that is time down the drain, never to be recovered.
I am seriously trying to figure out how to live more in alignment with my values. I feel as an independent contractor, I can design how I work - I can be honest - I can be ethical, I can do real estate "my way!" That is awesome!
Let me get back to you on the balance thing.
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