The Art of Work: A Proven Path to Discovering What You Were Meant to Do

Any great discovery, especially that of your life’s work, is never a single moment. In fact, epiphany is an evolutionary process; it happens in stages.

“The reality,” Eric explained, “is these are the cards we’ve been dealt, and we’ll just play them the best we can.” Eric Miller has always tried to steer his son in the direction of what he can do, not what he can’t.

When you pursue a calling, you will find a community of supporters to champion you along the way. It’s not up to you where these people come from or even how to locate them. You just need to keep your eyes open.

As you strive to achieve your life’s work, be careful of at what costs you chase it. It will be easy to resent those closest to you, to make your biggest supporters into your worst enemies. To hoard your work away from the rest of life. You may be tempted to see every relationship not as a lifeline, but as a competing force, something to be mistrus

Flow is the intersection of what you are good at and what challenges you—where difficulty and competency meet. When your competency exceeds the difficulty of a task, you are bored. And when the difficulty exceeds your competency, you are anxious.

Second, you respond. Mere words will not suffice—you must act.

When we see someone who has succeeded in spite of tremendous odds, we are tempted to proclaim this person a “self-made” man or woman. When we do this, though, we ignore an important fact, one that is essential to anyone’s success—they didn’t do it alone.

When you set out on the road to self-discovery, it will not just be you walking on that road.

identified seven common characteristics, each illustrated in the subsequent chapters.