"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the level of thinking that created them." - Albert Einstein

Follow this logic...

If you want something it's because you thought about it first. What gets you moving is how think, feel and act, in just this order.

• It's a fact people act on emotion. Salespeople are counting on it.
• Congruency between your thoughts, feelings and actions enhances your efficiency to fulfill your intentions; otherwise you act without thinking, do nothing, the wrong thing, or act half-heartedly. So control over how you think, feel and act is pretty important.

You don't live in response to your circumstances, but in response to your emotions that are caused by what you think about your circumstances.

• Your circumstances are meaningless until you assign them a meaning and react. You assign the meaning and are responsible for how you feel, what you do, and how others respond to you.
• This fact is easy to ignore because it eliminates your excuses and obligates you to take control of your thoughts and feelings to get what you desire. You can't see how powerful a simple thought really is because of the delay in time between when you have the thought and see its effect. If you could, you'd be more careful what you think.

What you think about most creates that reality because your resulting emotions cause you to act accordingly with those thoughts. Thoughts become things.

• Unfavorable thoughts of being dissatisfied with what you have or not getting what you desire inspire emotions associated with lacking and needing (fear, worry, anger, envy) and create doubt, inertia and procrastination. You oppose your own intentions.
• Favorable thoughts of already having what you desire, even if imagined, inspire emotions associated with contentment (joy, optimism, excitement, enthusiasm, gratitude) and fuel resolved actions that are congruent with and help to fulfill your intentions.
• Because you live in response to what you think and feel, by your imagination and ability to reason you can control or inspire your contented emotions whenever you like.

Contentment isn't found, it's a state of mind that you bring into existence by control of your thoughts and reasoning, and you recognize it as the agreeable middle ground.

• This explains why in situations where you're not happy or entirely satisfied, you can still recognize your contentment. It's an option you control.
• A contented state of mind is therefore not dependent on other people, material things, or the fulfillment of conditions or expectations. You can simply choose to feel this way regardless of your circumstances.

A contented state of mind can become a major source of your effectiveness and resiliency to endure.

• Independent of needs, wants, dissatisfactions and circumstances, a contented mind is peaceful, optimistic, thinks clearly, feels better and is therefore capable of making better choices.
• Your contentment takes into account your past, present and imagined future and reasons that while nothing is perfect, you still have control over your state of mind to create a better reality even without all the things you desire. So with or without whatever, you can still be content whenever.

Satisfaction is also a state of mind, but your reasoning alone is insufficient to bring it into existence because it's dependent on the fulfillment of conditions.

• Unlike contentment, satisfaction is conditional or dependent upon a need, want, obligation, effort, result or expectation being fulfilled before you can acknowledge being made satisfied. It's either/or, not optional.
• It's dependent on other people or material things, vulnerable to factors beyond your ability to control, and it may also be co-dependent upon you doing or not doing something.
• Regardless of whether satisfaction is intrinsic or extrinsic, it's still conditional upon how you feel in relation to what you get or don't get, have or don't have, what you or someone does or doesn't do.

Compared to satisfaction, contentment is easier to achieve and more within your ability to control, reason and recognize.

• Satisfaction is wonderful but getting there has and always will be a problem. You can't always control fulfillment of the conditions. It's also human nature to eventually want more or something new or different. This explains why dissatisfactions can persist from one generation to the next.
• But regardless if you're satisfied or not, you still have control over how you think, your emotions and your choices, which makes it possible in any situation to recognize the middle ground and benefit from your contentment.

Contentment proves that it's possible to live without satisfaction, but it would be difficult if not impossible to live without contentment.

• The world in which you live is not perfect, and not everything is likely to go your way. Thank goodness when you're dissatisfied or discontent, you can still rely upon the control of your thoughts and reasoning to recognize your contentment.
• What would you do without the agreeable middle ground or option to endure, hang in there, make due, get by, see things through, and make things happen regardless of whether you're satisfied or not?
• You not only need contentment, you'd be miserable without it, particularly in situations where you lack total control or when you're dependent upon others for things you want and need. Like your job and the people you work with.

Job satisfaction wouldn't exist if it weren't for something the employer owned and offered to attract, motivate and keep you satisfied.

• It's conditional upon the job, pay, bonus, benefits, quality of supervision, training, promotion opportunities, working conditions, safety, security, etc. Things the employer owns.
• The employer puts a price on these things. You have to earn them and there are no guarantees. That's why you're dissatisfied if you lack just one, even if all the other things are fine.
• You have no control over what the employer owns, offers or may suddenly decide to take away except by the effectiveness of your performance or your choice of jobs and employers.

Applied to your career, contentment is not laid back or settling for less because that might get you fired. Nor is it the alternative to job satisfaction.

• Your contentment on the job is a beneficial state of mind that supplements your potential to more fully enjoy your work and control your direction, with or without job satisfaction.
• Because it's a state of mind, it's not dependent upon employers, people, material things, or job satisfaction. You own it, have control over when you recognize it, and it enables you the independence to pursue the jobs and careers you desire. It gives you options and eliminates excuses for not using them.
• From a contented mind arises your potential for increased effectiveness and a greater ability to endure the inevitable job dissatisfactions.
• You're least inclined to recognize your contentment when your job lacks meaning. When you're in the wrong job or prohibited from using your talents to fulfill your callings, and only you can fix this by changing your thinking, performance, talents, jobs or employers. With all these options why choose to remain dissatisfied?

Your career is the pursuit of contentment derived from work made meaningful by the use of your talents to fulfill your callings and purpose.

• Your most enduring factor to have and enjoy a meaningful career is your career contentment. Your state of mind and ability to leverage your talents and pursue your callings, but also to endure by reasoning to recognize the agreeable middle ground in any situation. It's up to you.
• It enables you the clarity, resolve and independence to choose and change your purposes, occupations, jobs and employers, and this is why your career is the pursuit of contentment.
• Your career is not just the pursuit of satisfactions that keep you dependent on employers and your "nose to the grindstone." While satisfactions are necessary, they are here today, gone tomorrow, outsourced, downsized, restructured, taken away and dependent upon people or things you can't control. But you can always recognize the middle ground and benefit from your contentment.

A contented state of mind offers you the means to end job dissatisfaction. That's because if you want something, you think about it first and what gets you moving is how you feel.

Join the Campaign to Retire Job Dissatisfaction

"I'd rather be dead than singing "Satisfaction" when I'm forty-five." Mick Jagger, English singer, songwriter, actor.

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