We’ll continue looking at how discovering your natural talents can make a positive difference in your life at any age, at any stage of the game. <

EXAMPLE 1

Sam, 60, just retired from a dismal career selling insurance. He hated it, and predictably, was mediocre at it. He was planning to escape to Bermuda. However, our conversations revealed he’d really like to be doing fulfilling work—for the first time in his life.

The results of Sam’s StrengthsFinder™ profile ( http://www.susandunn.cc/assessments.htm ) were: Positivity, WOO (Winning Others Over), Empathy, Communicator and Activator. Positivity (=optimism), is the facilitator of EQ and all good things, and also the prime predictor for a successful salesperson.

Something didn’t make sense.

A month later ... it turns out he had no confidence because he had never finished college. (The CISS showed this discrepancy.) Having attended a prep school, where he was in the bottom 1%, he had the impression he was dumb. He was then forced to leave college and get a job to support his family. His wife said she’d divorce him if he became a pilot, which was what he wanted to do. (The marriage dissolved anyway, of course.)

On The EQ-Map(r) ( http://www.essisystems.com/associates/clickthru.cgi?id=susandunn ), he scored high, and emotional intelligence is more important to your success and happiness than your IQ. Though sometimes someone has to tell you that!

While his strengths were in fact not academic (there are some called Intellection, Learner and Input), he was able to see the unique strengths he had that others did not and therefore to have more confidence in what he had to offer a corporation.

He’s now selling something meaningful to him,

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EXAMPLE 2

Lulwa, a recent college graduate, is just starting a career selling insurance. She wonders if she has what it takes.

Her Campbell Interest & Skill Survey (CISS) ( http://assessments.ncspearson.com/assessments/tests/ciss.htm ) showed sales was a good fit for her, but it showed she had low confidence and needed to develop more skills in certain areas. This is understandable for someone just starting out in such a challenging field.

In coaching she decided “it’s in my blood,” and decide to invest the time in learning through experience on the job.

EXAMPLE 3

Tatiana is 40 and was a high-paid corporate manager. She also had migraines and chronic back pain, was having anxiety attacks, and had lost the desire to get up and go to work in the morning.

It turns out she had a dream – she wanted to be a professional photographer. Hers was a case of parental and societal expectations combined with “the golden handcuffs”—yes, it’s for sure she took a cut in pay.

However, she’s now in excellent physical and mental health, and knows it was the right decision. In EQ terms, we would say she had been letting her mind rule her heart, and others answer for her; what she wanted to do, didn’t “make sense” to her. Our bodies are faithful to our needs and emotions. They often give us the message we refuse to hear in any other way.

Our coaching revealed that someone else’s dream, and money alone, is never the path to happiness. Read “The Top Ten Ways to Achieve Happiness" ( http://topten.org/public/BL/BL209.html ).

It’s never too early; it’s never too late!

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