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Love + Work: How to Find What You Love, Love What You Do, and Do It for the Rest of Your Life
We're in the middle of an epidemic of stress and anxiety. A global pandemic has wreaked havoc on our lives. Average life expectancy in the United States is down. At work, less than 16 percent of us are fully engaged. In many high-stress jobs, such as distribution centers, emergency room nursing, and teaching, incidences of PTSD are higher than for soldiers returning from war zones.
We're getting something terribly wrong. We've designed the love out of our workplaces, and our schools too, so that they fail utterly to provide for or capitalize on one of our most basic human needs: our need for love.
As Marcus Buckingham shows in this eye-opening, uplifting book, love is an energy, and like all forms of energy, it must flow. It demands expression—and that expression is work. Whether in our professional accomplishments, our relationships, or our response to all the many slings and arrows of life, we know that none of this work will be our best unless it is made with love. There's no learning without love, no innovation, no service, no sustainable growth. Love and work are inextricable.
Buckingham first starkly highlights the contours of our loveless work lives and explains how we got here. Next, he relates how we all develop best in response to other human beings. What does a great work relationship look like when the other person is cued to your loves? What does a great team look like when each member is primed to be a mirror, an amplifier, of the loves of another? Finally, he shows how you can weave love back into the world of work as a force for good, how you can use your daily life routines to pinpoint your specific loves, and how you can make this a discipline for the rest of your life.
Today, too often, love comes last at work, and we are living the painful consequences of this. Love + Work powerfully shows why love must come first—and how we can make this happen.
We're getting something terribly wrong. We've designed the love out of our workplaces, and our schools too, so that they fail utterly to provide for or capitalize on one of our most basic human needs: our need for love.
As Marcus Buckingham shows in this eye-opening, uplifting book, love is an energy, and like all forms of energy, it must flow. It demands expression—and that expression is work. Whether in our professional accomplishments, our relationships, or our response to all the many slings and arrows of life, we know that none of this work will be our best unless it is made with love. There's no learning without love, no innovation, no service, no sustainable growth. Love and work are inextricable.
Buckingham first starkly highlights the contours of our loveless work lives and explains how we got here. Next, he relates how we all develop best in response to other human beings. What does a great work relationship look like when the other person is cued to your loves? What does a great team look like when each member is primed to be a mirror, an amplifier, of the loves of another? Finally, he shows how you can weave love back into the world of work as a force for good, how you can use your daily life routines to pinpoint your specific loves, and how you can make this a discipline for the rest of your life.
Today, too often, love comes last at work, and we are living the painful consequences of this. Love + Work powerfully shows why love must come first—and how we can make this happen.
256 pages, Hardcover
First published April 5, 2022
509 people are currently reading
3722 people want to read
About the author
Marcus Buckingham
84 books613 followersIn a world where efficiency and competency rule the workplace, where do personal strengths fit in?
It's a complex question, one that intrigued Cambridge-educated Marcus Buckingham so greatly, he set out to answer it by challenging years of social theory and utilizing his nearly two decades of research experience as a Sr. Researcher at Gallup Organization to break through the preconceptions about achievements and get to the core of what drives success.
The result of his persistence, and arguably the definitive answer to the strengths question can be found in Buckingham's four best-selling books First, Break All the Rules (coauthored with Curt Coffman, Simon & Schuster, 1999); Now, Discover Your Strengths (coauthored with Donald O. Clifton, The Free Press, 2001); The One Thing You Need to Know (The Free Press, 2005) and Go Put Your Strengths To Work (The Free Press, 2007). The author gives important insights to maximizing strengths, understanding the crucial differences between leadership and management, and fulfilling the quest for long-lasting personal success. In his most recent book, Buckingham offers ways to apply your strengths for maximum success at work.
What would happen if men and women spent more than 75% of each day on the job using their strongest skills and engaged in their favorite tasks, basically doing exactly what they wanted to do?
According to Marcus Buckingham (who spent years interviewing thousands of employees at every career stage and who is widely considered one of the world's leading authorities on employee productivity and the practices of leading and managing), companies that focus on cultivating employees' strengths rather than simply improving their weaknesses stand to dramatically increase efficiency while allowing for maximum personal growth and success.
If such a theory sounds revolutionary, that's because it is. Marcus Buckingham calls it the “strengths revolution.”
As he addresses more than 250,000 people around the globe each year, Buckingham touts this strengths revolution as the key to finding the most effective route to personal success and the missing link to the efficiency, competency, and success for which many companies constantly strive.
To kick-start the strengths revolution, Buckingham and Gallup developed the StrengthsFinder exam (StrengthsFinder.com), which identifies signature themes that help employees quantify their personal strengths in the workplace and at home. Since the StrengthsFinder debuted in 2001, more than 1 million people have discovered their strengths with this useful and important tool.
In his role as author, independent consultant and speaker, Marcus Buckingham has been the subject of in-depth profiles in The New York Times, Fortune, Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, USA Today and the Wall Street Journal and is routinely lauded by such corporations as Toyota, Coca-Cola, Master Foods, Wells Fargo, Yahoo and Disney as an invaluable resource in informing, challenging, mentoring and inspiring people to find their strengths and obtain and sustain long-lasting personal success.
A wonderful resource for leaders, managers, and educators, Buckingham challenges conventional wisdom and shows the link between engaged employees and productivity, profit, customer satisfaction, and the rate of turnover. Buckingham graduated from Cambridge University in 1987 with a master's degree in Social and Political Science.
It's a complex question, one that intrigued Cambridge-educated Marcus Buckingham so greatly, he set out to answer it by challenging years of social theory and utilizing his nearly two decades of research experience as a Sr. Researcher at Gallup Organization to break through the preconceptions about achievements and get to the core of what drives success.
The result of his persistence, and arguably the definitive answer to the strengths question can be found in Buckingham's four best-selling books First, Break All the Rules (coauthored with Curt Coffman, Simon & Schuster, 1999); Now, Discover Your Strengths (coauthored with Donald O. Clifton, The Free Press, 2001); The One Thing You Need to Know (The Free Press, 2005) and Go Put Your Strengths To Work (The Free Press, 2007). The author gives important insights to maximizing strengths, understanding the crucial differences between leadership and management, and fulfilling the quest for long-lasting personal success. In his most recent book, Buckingham offers ways to apply your strengths for maximum success at work.
What would happen if men and women spent more than 75% of each day on the job using their strongest skills and engaged in their favorite tasks, basically doing exactly what they wanted to do?
According to Marcus Buckingham (who spent years interviewing thousands of employees at every career stage and who is widely considered one of the world's leading authorities on employee productivity and the practices of leading and managing), companies that focus on cultivating employees' strengths rather than simply improving their weaknesses stand to dramatically increase efficiency while allowing for maximum personal growth and success.
If such a theory sounds revolutionary, that's because it is. Marcus Buckingham calls it the “strengths revolution.”
As he addresses more than 250,000 people around the globe each year, Buckingham touts this strengths revolution as the key to finding the most effective route to personal success and the missing link to the efficiency, competency, and success for which many companies constantly strive.
To kick-start the strengths revolution, Buckingham and Gallup developed the StrengthsFinder exam (StrengthsFinder.com), which identifies signature themes that help employees quantify their personal strengths in the workplace and at home. Since the StrengthsFinder debuted in 2001, more than 1 million people have discovered their strengths with this useful and important tool.
In his role as author, independent consultant and speaker, Marcus Buckingham has been the subject of in-depth profiles in The New York Times, Fortune, Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, USA Today and the Wall Street Journal and is routinely lauded by such corporations as Toyota, Coca-Cola, Master Foods, Wells Fargo, Yahoo and Disney as an invaluable resource in informing, challenging, mentoring and inspiring people to find their strengths and obtain and sustain long-lasting personal success.
A wonderful resource for leaders, managers, and educators, Buckingham challenges conventional wisdom and shows the link between engaged employees and productivity, profit, customer satisfaction, and the rate of turnover. Buckingham graduated from Cambridge University in 1987 with a master's degree in Social and Political Science.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 168 reviews
March 22, 2022
Sadly I abandoned this book at around 16%. I skimmed-read until about 20% to see if I could convince myself to continue reading it, but there wasn't any way for me to power through this book.
The book's description says "World-renowned researcher and New York Times bestselling author Marcus Buckingham helps us discover where we're at our best—both at work and in life." which gave me expectations for a well-rounded and researched book about purpose and career, identifying your strengths and learning to bring them forward in your interactions with the world. Instead I was met with an intensively emotional language and many assumptions in discourse in a potentially harmful way.
In addition to not having a gripping narration, the book explored the emotional undertones with passages like “linger on this truth, you have galaxies within you”. Buckingham introduced us to his fiancée by using a weird and highly personal extract of her journal without cause other than to parade her pain and suffering - he could easily have picked any famous person sad story instead.
One part that really caught my attention and was the first indication I'd DNF the book was the weird implications of school and education system. Even if I agree that the current education system doesn’t necessarily is the basis for a complete life, it does offer transferable skills that will help develop critical thinking. Instead, the author chose to treat it as an institution that has nothing to offer and only hinders children's ability to know their "true self". In the same part of the book, Buckingham also writes Insinuations that parents made their children “surely” intending to offer them love, showing disregard for people’s different past and/or traumatic experiences.
When I finally arrived at the gist of the book, I was met with another highly personal narrative. The concept that fueling your uniqueness is the sole way of achieving something you love based on your Wyrd - an “ancient Norse term”, “explicitly spiritual”, so big that the true extent of your uniqueness is more “than five thousand Milky Ways” - is so far from what I expected that it made me roll my eyes.
The last straw for me was when the author started using clear categorization to contradict what he himself called categorization as done by “most of Psychology and Social Psychology”. This is not the book I’d expect to be published by Harvard Business Review Press. It has no grounding in science or references to actual published work of scientific value - the book has a total of 7 references, in chapter 1, 2, 3, 6, 18 (with 2) and 20, and only 2 don’t quote a work by the author of the book. Oh, one of those references is the book “The Prophet”, by Kahlil Gibran.
Thanks NetGalley and Harvard Business Review Press for the EARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
The book's description says "World-renowned researcher and New York Times bestselling author Marcus Buckingham helps us discover where we're at our best—both at work and in life." which gave me expectations for a well-rounded and researched book about purpose and career, identifying your strengths and learning to bring them forward in your interactions with the world. Instead I was met with an intensively emotional language and many assumptions in discourse in a potentially harmful way.
In addition to not having a gripping narration, the book explored the emotional undertones with passages like “linger on this truth, you have galaxies within you”. Buckingham introduced us to his fiancée by using a weird and highly personal extract of her journal without cause other than to parade her pain and suffering - he could easily have picked any famous person sad story instead.
One part that really caught my attention and was the first indication I'd DNF the book was the weird implications of school and education system. Even if I agree that the current education system doesn’t necessarily is the basis for a complete life, it does offer transferable skills that will help develop critical thinking. Instead, the author chose to treat it as an institution that has nothing to offer and only hinders children's ability to know their "true self". In the same part of the book, Buckingham also writes Insinuations that parents made their children “surely” intending to offer them love, showing disregard for people’s different past and/or traumatic experiences.
When I finally arrived at the gist of the book, I was met with another highly personal narrative. The concept that fueling your uniqueness is the sole way of achieving something you love based on your Wyrd - an “ancient Norse term”, “explicitly spiritual”, so big that the true extent of your uniqueness is more “than five thousand Milky Ways” - is so far from what I expected that it made me roll my eyes.
The last straw for me was when the author started using clear categorization to contradict what he himself called categorization as done by “most of Psychology and Social Psychology”. This is not the book I’d expect to be published by Harvard Business Review Press. It has no grounding in science or references to actual published work of scientific value - the book has a total of 7 references, in chapter 1, 2, 3, 6, 18 (with 2) and 20, and only 2 don’t quote a work by the author of the book. Oh, one of those references is the book “The Prophet”, by Kahlil Gibran.
Thanks NetGalley and Harvard Business Review Press for the EARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
March 14, 2022
I’m not sure how to write this review – and having written more than 100 previously – that may be a curious thing to say. But having read Love + Work, I know that author Marcus Buckingham will immediately understand. Not understand why I’m having difficulty, for that’s my reason, but understand that it’s not the process of writing the review that’s important to others, but the outcome. The process (the activity of writing) is very important to me, but to you, the reader, it’s the outcome – the review that’s important.
Serendipity? I had three similar experiences to Marcus Buckingham that endeared me to this book – you may find others – or none (more on one of these shortly). And that’s one of the key themes, to find what Marcus calls your “red threads”, your uniqueness. To find the “what” of your work role, the activities that turn you on, and are the important things that will make you love your work. As he says, “Find what you love, and love what you do”. I’ll be a bit cheeky here and give one of my own quotes which I think sums up Marcus’ philosophy about work, “You should find something you like doing so much that you’d do it for nothing – then find someone who will pay you for doing it”.
As an example of finding this love, Marcus asks, “Do you have a chance to use your strengths every day? In the last week, have you felt excited to work every day?”.
To find out what you love to do, Marcus, suggests that you’ll need to learn a new language, the language of love – this is not the traditional notion of “romantic love” (although he does discuss that in relation to work), but the love of work.
The very first word to learn in this language is Wyrd. It’s pronounced the same as weird but it’s a noun, as in “You have a Wyrd.” Apparently, it’s an ancient Norse term and the source of your Wyrd is all the activities (or threads) that literally turn you on and make you uniquely you. Marcus terms these your “red threads”. And if you can find these, you’ll be able to seek out work that includes these red threads and provides you with satisfaction, motivation and engagement (later in the book, Marcus suggests ways that employers, managers and leaders can provide strategies for allowing different people doing similar jobs, to find their red threads).
Which brings me to one of the experiences I had that was similar to Marcus’ and which started him down the path of identifying his red threads and ultimately establishing his Wyrd as a world class researcher of what makes people unique. It happened when he was nine and in one of the four “House” teams set up by his school to create team loyalties and competitiveness. One day in athletics, as boys were attempting the high-jump, Marcus happened to look around at the boys watching, and as a boy ran up to the high-jump bar, the watchers all lifted a leg off the ground. This happened for all jumpers, irrespective of which House they represented. Apparently, they were empathised with the jumper through their mirror neurons. As Marcus points out, Giacomo Rizzolatti, and his team discovered the existence of these mirror neurons, and that “the leg lifting was a manifestation of our instinctive response to mirror the emotions and actions of others”.
Yet interestingly, when Marcus asked boys after the event, “Why did you lift your leg when another boy was jumping?”, they all denied it! This experience was the start of Marcus identifying one of his red threads, which later in life would lead to many people-research projects and writing books such as “Love + Work”.
My experience was similar to Marcus’, only mine happened when I was 16. I too was fascinated, well, to be truthful, I found it more humorous at the time, to see the boys lifting their leg at the high-jump attempts. Nor did I ask the boys why they did it – I ruminated on it. My “red thread” from this experience was different and took me quite some years to eventually develop a Wyrd that has become a lifelong desire to understand how people learn.
In Love + Work you’ll find many great activities/questions/suggestions to help you develop your own Wyrd, such as the Red Thread Questionnaire, and to whet your appetite, here’s a snippet:
“When was the last time . . .
. . . you lost track of time?
. . . you instinctively volunteered for something?
. . . someone had to tear you away from what you were doing?”
This is necessarily one of the longest reviews I have written, and if there’s one comment I would make (and it’s probably reflected in the length of this review), is that Marcus does (for me) take considerable time to get to the key points of the discussion. However, take the time, please read this book, and find your Wyrd – you’ll find that your time is really well spent and may indeed change some of the things (or activities) you look for in your current work, or perhaps future career role.
Highly recommended – it’s probably Marcus Buckingham’s best book.
Bob Selden, www.bobselden.com
Serendipity? I had three similar experiences to Marcus Buckingham that endeared me to this book – you may find others – or none (more on one of these shortly). And that’s one of the key themes, to find what Marcus calls your “red threads”, your uniqueness. To find the “what” of your work role, the activities that turn you on, and are the important things that will make you love your work. As he says, “Find what you love, and love what you do”. I’ll be a bit cheeky here and give one of my own quotes which I think sums up Marcus’ philosophy about work, “You should find something you like doing so much that you’d do it for nothing – then find someone who will pay you for doing it”.
As an example of finding this love, Marcus asks, “Do you have a chance to use your strengths every day? In the last week, have you felt excited to work every day?”.
To find out what you love to do, Marcus, suggests that you’ll need to learn a new language, the language of love – this is not the traditional notion of “romantic love” (although he does discuss that in relation to work), but the love of work.
The very first word to learn in this language is Wyrd. It’s pronounced the same as weird but it’s a noun, as in “You have a Wyrd.” Apparently, it’s an ancient Norse term and the source of your Wyrd is all the activities (or threads) that literally turn you on and make you uniquely you. Marcus terms these your “red threads”. And if you can find these, you’ll be able to seek out work that includes these red threads and provides you with satisfaction, motivation and engagement (later in the book, Marcus suggests ways that employers, managers and leaders can provide strategies for allowing different people doing similar jobs, to find their red threads).
Which brings me to one of the experiences I had that was similar to Marcus’ and which started him down the path of identifying his red threads and ultimately establishing his Wyrd as a world class researcher of what makes people unique. It happened when he was nine and in one of the four “House” teams set up by his school to create team loyalties and competitiveness. One day in athletics, as boys were attempting the high-jump, Marcus happened to look around at the boys watching, and as a boy ran up to the high-jump bar, the watchers all lifted a leg off the ground. This happened for all jumpers, irrespective of which House they represented. Apparently, they were empathised with the jumper through their mirror neurons. As Marcus points out, Giacomo Rizzolatti, and his team discovered the existence of these mirror neurons, and that “the leg lifting was a manifestation of our instinctive response to mirror the emotions and actions of others”.
Yet interestingly, when Marcus asked boys after the event, “Why did you lift your leg when another boy was jumping?”, they all denied it! This experience was the start of Marcus identifying one of his red threads, which later in life would lead to many people-research projects and writing books such as “Love + Work”.
My experience was similar to Marcus’, only mine happened when I was 16. I too was fascinated, well, to be truthful, I found it more humorous at the time, to see the boys lifting their leg at the high-jump attempts. Nor did I ask the boys why they did it – I ruminated on it. My “red thread” from this experience was different and took me quite some years to eventually develop a Wyrd that has become a lifelong desire to understand how people learn.
In Love + Work you’ll find many great activities/questions/suggestions to help you develop your own Wyrd, such as the Red Thread Questionnaire, and to whet your appetite, here’s a snippet:
“When was the last time . . .
. . . you lost track of time?
. . . you instinctively volunteered for something?
. . . someone had to tear you away from what you were doing?”
This is necessarily one of the longest reviews I have written, and if there’s one comment I would make (and it’s probably reflected in the length of this review), is that Marcus does (for me) take considerable time to get to the key points of the discussion. However, take the time, please read this book, and find your Wyrd – you’ll find that your time is really well spent and may indeed change some of the things (or activities) you look for in your current work, or perhaps future career role.
Highly recommended – it’s probably Marcus Buckingham’s best book.
Bob Selden, www.bobselden.com
February 15, 2022
Interesting, confusing, illuminating...I learned some things to really help me in the future. I had a bit of a hard time relating to some of the life experiences that Marcus had. I did find his tip on getting in front of people very helpful. I took away from this book, it's great when your heart and soul are both in whatever you are doing.
Thank you Harvard Business Review Press and NetGalley for the advance read
Thank you Harvard Business Review Press and NetGalley for the advance read
July 26, 2022
I expected this book to have ideas supported by research. Instead, it is largely the author’s opinions and musings based on his life experiences and the experiences of his current wife and ex-wife. The subject of his ex-wife’s college cheating scandal came up multiple times, which felt wholly unnecessary and didn’t add anything to the book, it was just awkward. There were a couple of good nuggets I’ll take away from this book, but overall it was just another book that would have been better suited to a 10 min Ted talk.
June 1, 2025
I loved this so much. I'm early career and still feel fresh out of the "gifted kid" pipeline from parochial pre-k indoctrinating me with Western religion and moral codes; to failing the test to enter California's GATE program; to being invited to join anyway due to my personality; to fighting to pull myself into the middle class by graduating from an elitist PWI university; to nearly ending myself while getting an advanced degree at night while working full-time corporate.
Needless to say, I have spent more time judging myself and my failings than learning about my loves, or my "Wyrd" as Marcus Buckingham describes in this book.
Recent changes at my job have caused me to seek out answers from mentors and leaders. This book found me at the perfect time and I have simmered on its teachings as I do the work he recommends of journaling, thinking, observing my energy. I have thought about this book often and suggested other people I know read it. While it may feel "woo-woo" or sentimental to some, it struck all the right chords with me and has empowered me to take my life and the time I have into my own hands.
This book is a gift and I am lucky to have read it.
Needless to say, I have spent more time judging myself and my failings than learning about my loves, or my "Wyrd" as Marcus Buckingham describes in this book.
Recent changes at my job have caused me to seek out answers from mentors and leaders. This book found me at the perfect time and I have simmered on its teachings as I do the work he recommends of journaling, thinking, observing my energy. I have thought about this book often and suggested other people I know read it. While it may feel "woo-woo" or sentimental to some, it struck all the right chords with me and has empowered me to take my life and the time I have into my own hands.
This book is a gift and I am lucky to have read it.
March 10, 2022
I am so happy that I was able to read this ARC of Love + Work by Marcus Buckingham, gifted by NetGalley.
I've taken the StrengthsFinders assessment twice in my career and I loved everything that I learned about myself, but also the people who work around me and for me. I was eager to dive right into this book which I treated as a follow-up to those lessons.
The main theme of the book is that everyone is different and our loves are all different - not a unique idea, but where it took off was that to love our work, we need to weave these loves into our work. That doesn't mean our love(s) is 100% of our work, but it needs to be 20%. The book then begins down the path, laying out "the map", to taking your loves seriously and learning how to find them and identify them.
I probably could have read through the book in one sitting, but I liked being able to read a chapter here and there and digest it. I can't wait to take my own Red Thread Questionnaire and see how it goes with my team at work, too. So much useful info for me in my own career but also as a leader of people.
I found the last 15% or so of the book focused on schooling to be useful to me as a parent of a young child, but I felt it was a little out of place in this book about finding my love in my work. I didn't disagree with the info but felt it wouldn't connect to someone without kids, and it's a large part of the end of the book.
I'm giving the book a very solid 3 stars. There are some great takeaways and tangible items that I can look at later and apply over and over to my life. That the book ended with chapters about how to change schools, took a bit away from the excitement that I was feeling. I would definitely recommend this to a friend looking to recapture their love of the work that they do.
I've taken the StrengthsFinders assessment twice in my career and I loved everything that I learned about myself, but also the people who work around me and for me. I was eager to dive right into this book which I treated as a follow-up to those lessons.
The main theme of the book is that everyone is different and our loves are all different - not a unique idea, but where it took off was that to love our work, we need to weave these loves into our work. That doesn't mean our love(s) is 100% of our work, but it needs to be 20%. The book then begins down the path, laying out "the map", to taking your loves seriously and learning how to find them and identify them.
I probably could have read through the book in one sitting, but I liked being able to read a chapter here and there and digest it. I can't wait to take my own Red Thread Questionnaire and see how it goes with my team at work, too. So much useful info for me in my own career but also as a leader of people.
I found the last 15% or so of the book focused on schooling to be useful to me as a parent of a young child, but I felt it was a little out of place in this book about finding my love in my work. I didn't disagree with the info but felt it wouldn't connect to someone without kids, and it's a large part of the end of the book.
I'm giving the book a very solid 3 stars. There are some great takeaways and tangible items that I can look at later and apply over and over to my life. That the book ended with chapters about how to change schools, took a bit away from the excitement that I was feeling. I would definitely recommend this to a friend looking to recapture their love of the work that they do.
May 3, 2022
Inspirational, revelational and frightening at the same time…
Marcus’s best book to date.
The core thesis about the power of doing work from a place of love is both radical (returning to the source) and such common sense, but sadly all too rarely experienced.
This book weaves together several strands from his previous books and integrates them into a new and very practical framework to equip you to figure out what you love in your work and how to do more of it.
As much a manifesto as a how-to guide, personally I’m both motivated and scared to fully embrace what he’s arguing for, as to seek love is to open yourself up to the possibility of pain.
Becoming aware that you loathe the work you do and that there’s little to no potential to do it with love is something I know I’ve found soul crushing in the past, and am struggling with right now.
So while I know what I need to do,
the thought of it is deeply disturbing.
But if I want to do more than just survive, then at least the path has been made clear.
Thank you, Marcus, for showing us how.
Marcus’s best book to date.
The core thesis about the power of doing work from a place of love is both radical (returning to the source) and such common sense, but sadly all too rarely experienced.
This book weaves together several strands from his previous books and integrates them into a new and very practical framework to equip you to figure out what you love in your work and how to do more of it.
As much a manifesto as a how-to guide, personally I’m both motivated and scared to fully embrace what he’s arguing for, as to seek love is to open yourself up to the possibility of pain.
Becoming aware that you loathe the work you do and that there’s little to no potential to do it with love is something I know I’ve found soul crushing in the past, and am struggling with right now.
So while I know what I need to do,
the thought of it is deeply disturbing.
But if I want to do more than just survive, then at least the path has been made clear.
Thank you, Marcus, for showing us how.
April 22, 2025
Really enjoyed this. It felt like it wandered a bit at the end, but it was relevant considering what he's been through. Still worth the read.
December 28, 2024
Truly advice that’s only relevant if you are wildly privileged and have an incredible boss to support you. Not particularly helpful for those trying to understand how to move forward in their career or those considering what they want.
November 13, 2025
Definitely good insights I’ll be chewing on. I’m challenged to think outside of the box for my own career and how I manage others but it felt long winded and seemed to contradict in some parts. The framework was a bit too loose for me to what incorporating what you love into work actually meant.
December 17, 2024
I really liked hearing him speak at a conference but I didn’t love this. Kinda felt like a lot of different things rolled into one. Some good ideas but overall, not my fave.
June 24, 2025
I am so down bad about work I think I’m in the 6th dimension of self help books lol but honestly really loved this
April 15, 2022
If you have read books by MB before you will understand the premise of this book right away.
It is a very personal account of his experiences and his insights into finding the 'red threads' in what you do - the things in your day that give you a buzz.
I found the book to be uplifting and practical.
It is a very personal account of his experiences and his insights into finding the 'red threads' in what you do - the things in your day that give you a buzz.
I found the book to be uplifting and practical.
March 16, 2023
Marcus had some good nuggets toward the end of the book. However, I feel this book lacks the perspective of people who may not have been afforded the same privileges in life. In a perfect world, we would all be in love with our occupation; however, love and passion don’t always pay the bills.
Also, taking life advice from someone whose family was involved in the college admissions scandal does not sit well with me.
Also, taking life advice from someone whose family was involved in the college admissions scandal does not sit well with me.
August 5, 2022
This is Marcus Buckingham’s tenth book, and I’ve read most of them. I’ve especially been helped by his work on strengths, and in particular his 2007 book Go Put Your Strengths to Work. A lot of has changed for Buckingham since then, including getting divorced and now engaged, his family going through the college cheating scandal and currently being the cohead of the ADP Research Institute.
There is a lot to process in this book about work (which I was most interested in), school, relationships and parenting. Some of his observations and recommendations may come across as shocking. For example, he tells us that high school, college and work are built in such a way as to distract your attention from your unique loves and loathes, and instead convince you that there’s nothing enduringly unique about you. He states that they are purpose-built to persuade you that you’re an empty vessel, and that your chief challenge in life is to fill this empty vessel with the skills, knowledge, grades, and degrees required to climb to the next rung on the ladder. He writes that we must find ways to put love back into our lives—into our schools and our workplaces, our parenting and our relationships.
Buckingham tells us that people generally don’t spend much time learning about who they are at their very best. To do anything great in your life, he tells us, you will have to take seriously what you love and express it in some sort of productive way. In this book, he shares what he has learned through research data, gives us some questions we can ask ourselves, and tries to teach us a brand-new language to make sense of us in our world. He also shares a lot of stories from his own life.
Buckingham writes that to help you find yourself again and thrive in a life that feels fully your own, you’re going to need to learn a new language, your love language (but not “those” love languages). The very first word to learn in this language is Wyrd. It’s an ancient Norse term, the idea that each person is born with a distinct spirit. This spirit is unique to you, and guides you to love some things and loathe others. To discover your Wyrd, trust in your loves.
He also introduces us to our red thread activities. He describes these as follows:
“When we are inside an activity we love we are enveloped, so in the moment that we are no longer aware of ourselves. You are not doing the activity. You are the activity. Activities where you disappear within them, and time flies by.”
He tells us that our red threads won’t tell us in which particular job we will be successful. Instead, they’ll reveal how we - one particular individual - will be most successful in whatever job we happen to choose. He provides “The Red Thread Questionnaire” to help us to identify our red threads. Once you identify your red threads – your strengths - your challenge will be to weave them into the fabric of your life, both at home and at work.
He shares three signs of love—instinct, flow and rapid learning. He shares his feeling about being open to feedback, advice from others and other’s reactions. He shares five myths and truths to guide you in becoming a Love + Work leader. He shares his feelings about cascading goals, performance ratings, centralized employee opinion surveys, and performance feedback tools. He shares a “Love + Work Organization Interview”, a manifesto for child-centered schools and colleges, and thoughts on a space-making approach to parenting.
The book is about you and how you can make sense of yourself and build a relationship with yourself based on love. I really appreciated the parts of the book about our work and the workplace. Not being a parent, I was far less interested in the parts about parenting or schools.
Below are 20 of my favorite quotes from the book:
• How you feel at work—whether your work is uplifting or soul-destroying, whether it fulfills you or empties you out, whether it makes you feel valued or utterly useless—all of it will be experienced most keenly at home, by you and the ones you love.
• At work, according to the most recent data, less than 16 percent of us are fully engaged, with the rest of us just selling our time and our talent and getting compensated for our trouble.
• Your weaknesses need to be dealt with, but your instinctive loves are where you’ll experience exponential growth.
• Anything of value you offer to others is your work.
• When you see someone do something with excellence, there is always love in it.
• The only way you’ll make a lasting contribution in life is to deeply understand what it is that you love.
• The true purpose of your work is to help you discover that which you love: work is for love.
• You don’t need to love all you do. You just need to find the love in what you do.
• For your loves to turn into contribution, pay attention only to the specific activities you love, not the outcomes of those activities. Pay attention to what you are going to be doing, rather than why. “What,” in the end, always trumps the “why.”
• Virtually any job is awful and soul-destroying if it is being done by a person who doesn’t find love in it.
• We shouldn’t assume anyone performing a job excellently must find love in all aspects of it.
• In study after study, those people who reported that they had a chance to do something they loved each and every day were far more likely to be high performers and to stay in the role than those who reported that they believed in the mission of the company or liked their teammates. It’s not that those other two things are unimportant; it’s just that what you are actually being paid to do is more important.
• It’s up to you—no matter what role you find yourself in—to take responsibility for weaving what you love into what you’re being paid to do.
• Distraction is the enemy of excellence.
• Workers who reported that they felt part of a team were not only 2.7 times more likely to be fully engaged, they were three times more likely to be highly resilient and two times more likely to report a strong sense of belonging to their organization.
• If you are not part of a team, our data shows, less than 10 percent of you feel engaged, resilient, and connected.
• Many organizations impose on you processes and tools that appear to have been designed to deliberately distance you from who you really are.
• If you can’t give each person weekly attention in some disciplined way, some way that starts with them and their answers, then you will be driving love out of your workplace, with all of the negative repercussions that come with it.
• The reality of what it’s like to work in the organization is always and only a function of your fellow team members and your team leader. The data on this is unequivocal.
• Trust is just everything. Without trust you can’t usher love into your organization.
There is a lot to process in this book about work (which I was most interested in), school, relationships and parenting. Some of his observations and recommendations may come across as shocking. For example, he tells us that high school, college and work are built in such a way as to distract your attention from your unique loves and loathes, and instead convince you that there’s nothing enduringly unique about you. He states that they are purpose-built to persuade you that you’re an empty vessel, and that your chief challenge in life is to fill this empty vessel with the skills, knowledge, grades, and degrees required to climb to the next rung on the ladder. He writes that we must find ways to put love back into our lives—into our schools and our workplaces, our parenting and our relationships.
Buckingham tells us that people generally don’t spend much time learning about who they are at their very best. To do anything great in your life, he tells us, you will have to take seriously what you love and express it in some sort of productive way. In this book, he shares what he has learned through research data, gives us some questions we can ask ourselves, and tries to teach us a brand-new language to make sense of us in our world. He also shares a lot of stories from his own life.
Buckingham writes that to help you find yourself again and thrive in a life that feels fully your own, you’re going to need to learn a new language, your love language (but not “those” love languages). The very first word to learn in this language is Wyrd. It’s an ancient Norse term, the idea that each person is born with a distinct spirit. This spirit is unique to you, and guides you to love some things and loathe others. To discover your Wyrd, trust in your loves.
He also introduces us to our red thread activities. He describes these as follows:
“When we are inside an activity we love we are enveloped, so in the moment that we are no longer aware of ourselves. You are not doing the activity. You are the activity. Activities where you disappear within them, and time flies by.”
He tells us that our red threads won’t tell us in which particular job we will be successful. Instead, they’ll reveal how we - one particular individual - will be most successful in whatever job we happen to choose. He provides “The Red Thread Questionnaire” to help us to identify our red threads. Once you identify your red threads – your strengths - your challenge will be to weave them into the fabric of your life, both at home and at work.
He shares three signs of love—instinct, flow and rapid learning. He shares his feeling about being open to feedback, advice from others and other’s reactions. He shares five myths and truths to guide you in becoming a Love + Work leader. He shares his feelings about cascading goals, performance ratings, centralized employee opinion surveys, and performance feedback tools. He shares a “Love + Work Organization Interview”, a manifesto for child-centered schools and colleges, and thoughts on a space-making approach to parenting.
The book is about you and how you can make sense of yourself and build a relationship with yourself based on love. I really appreciated the parts of the book about our work and the workplace. Not being a parent, I was far less interested in the parts about parenting or schools.
Below are 20 of my favorite quotes from the book:
• How you feel at work—whether your work is uplifting or soul-destroying, whether it fulfills you or empties you out, whether it makes you feel valued or utterly useless—all of it will be experienced most keenly at home, by you and the ones you love.
• At work, according to the most recent data, less than 16 percent of us are fully engaged, with the rest of us just selling our time and our talent and getting compensated for our trouble.
• Your weaknesses need to be dealt with, but your instinctive loves are where you’ll experience exponential growth.
• Anything of value you offer to others is your work.
• When you see someone do something with excellence, there is always love in it.
• The only way you’ll make a lasting contribution in life is to deeply understand what it is that you love.
• The true purpose of your work is to help you discover that which you love: work is for love.
• You don’t need to love all you do. You just need to find the love in what you do.
• For your loves to turn into contribution, pay attention only to the specific activities you love, not the outcomes of those activities. Pay attention to what you are going to be doing, rather than why. “What,” in the end, always trumps the “why.”
• Virtually any job is awful and soul-destroying if it is being done by a person who doesn’t find love in it.
• We shouldn’t assume anyone performing a job excellently must find love in all aspects of it.
• In study after study, those people who reported that they had a chance to do something they loved each and every day were far more likely to be high performers and to stay in the role than those who reported that they believed in the mission of the company or liked their teammates. It’s not that those other two things are unimportant; it’s just that what you are actually being paid to do is more important.
• It’s up to you—no matter what role you find yourself in—to take responsibility for weaving what you love into what you’re being paid to do.
• Distraction is the enemy of excellence.
• Workers who reported that they felt part of a team were not only 2.7 times more likely to be fully engaged, they were three times more likely to be highly resilient and two times more likely to report a strong sense of belonging to their organization.
• If you are not part of a team, our data shows, less than 10 percent of you feel engaged, resilient, and connected.
• Many organizations impose on you processes and tools that appear to have been designed to deliberately distance you from who you really are.
• If you can’t give each person weekly attention in some disciplined way, some way that starts with them and their answers, then you will be driving love out of your workplace, with all of the negative repercussions that come with it.
• The reality of what it’s like to work in the organization is always and only a function of your fellow team members and your team leader. The data on this is unequivocal.
• Trust is just everything. Without trust you can’t usher love into your organization.
January 9, 2025
There were parts of this book I really enjoyed. The idea that we don’t study what we love in the same way that we study anything else, and that doing so can be illuminating is helpful. The concept might even be revolutionary.
But I also felt certain of his ideas, impractical and maybe a bit privileged. Many of us can’t change the job that we are already working to fit us and our “red threads” better. Many jobs have little wiggle room to change the day to day tasks. And finding your “red threads” by either switching titles at your current job is not always easy nor is finding a new job just to see if you’re right ab a “red threads” is so much harder than he lets on.
Even his ideas about education, which felt more like a well-intended somewhat irrelevant side trail, just weren’t practical on a larger scale. And his comments ab parenting while valid did not seem to fit into this book. Partially, the parenting and education bit felt more like him making sense of his wife’s scandal than bringing light to his overall statement.
I loved the beginning of this book and will be thinking ab it. He also has a great audiobook voice.
But I also felt certain of his ideas, impractical and maybe a bit privileged. Many of us can’t change the job that we are already working to fit us and our “red threads” better. Many jobs have little wiggle room to change the day to day tasks. And finding your “red threads” by either switching titles at your current job is not always easy nor is finding a new job just to see if you’re right ab a “red threads” is so much harder than he lets on.
Even his ideas about education, which felt more like a well-intended somewhat irrelevant side trail, just weren’t practical on a larger scale. And his comments ab parenting while valid did not seem to fit into this book. Partially, the parenting and education bit felt more like him making sense of his wife’s scandal than bringing light to his overall statement.
I loved the beginning of this book and will be thinking ab it. He also has a great audiobook voice.
November 15, 2022
The basic premise of finding Flow and meaning to avoid burnout is fine. But this starts off oddly with a heavy emphasis on repeated personal anecdotes from the author's not very exciting life. Then at the end it just goes off the rails with the author's reaction to how his ex-wife was arrested by the FBI and featured on magazine covers as part of the big college admissions cheating scandal. This is not really about work but prompts a whole tangential diatribe about schools and grading that seems to be trying to absolve his ex (and his son) from responsibility for being part of a an outright fraud. This goes against a major part of the middle of the book, which emphasizes trust as a key to thriving workplaces.
I think it's better to just read Flow: Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
If you want a book about work with "Love" in the title: Love Is the Killer App: How to Win Business and Influence Friends
For problem-solving in management: The 4 Disciplines of Execution: Achieving Your Wildly Important Goals
I think it's better to just read Flow: Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
If you want a book about work with "Love" in the title: Love Is the Killer App: How to Win Business and Influence Friends
For problem-solving in management: The 4 Disciplines of Execution: Achieving Your Wildly Important Goals
June 29, 2022
A must read to avoid burnout and do the work you truly want to do. Also great commentary on the need for education reform.
March 6, 2023
This book did provide me few ways to change my perspective on work and how journey to find a career should go.
July 3, 2023
3.5: Had some good exercises for helping think about the things you love/value and what an ideal work environment is but it felt a bit preachy at times and I disagreed with some of the author's stances.
September 18, 2023
This book is what I needed to shake my head up in the best sort of way. To some it might be obvious but it’s spelled out here in a way that helps you be confident in exploring who you are.
November 8, 2023
Overall disappointing. There seemed to be so much promise and yet it was very repetitive.
I did find things to help me raise my kids though so in that sense it was interesting.
I did find things to help me raise my kids though so in that sense it was interesting.
February 25, 2024
Probably my favorite book of the year so far. Very interesting and well written.
December 11, 2024
In parts, too earnestly positive for me, but many interesting ideas to ponder. I think this one might be a slow burn.
January 26, 2025
Always a fan of Marcus Buckingham!!
July 29, 2025
very nice read.
loved the personal stories and the philosophical approach to what truly matters.
loved the personal stories and the philosophical approach to what truly matters.
April 16, 2024
Where do I start? I've listened to 2/3 of it and I gave up. I did like some ideas from the book but definitely not the language. The author presenting his view as a single point of truth, his arguments are very one-sided for a resercher, there are no references in the text to where he got the numbers from and often WHAT are the numbers, he also has contradictions there.
But when I got to the sertain chapter where he describes love it just made me feel like the whole point of the book was for him to vent about his divorse, his ex, his new partner and his thoughts on this subject.
But when I got to the sertain chapter where he describes love it just made me feel like the whole point of the book was for him to vent about his divorse, his ex, his new partner and his thoughts on this subject.
August 17, 2025
What no one is doing is starting with you, listening to you, paying attention to what you instinctively pay attention to, and giving you methods and techniques to then apply these unique gifts in the world. Which is a problem for you since, as Steve Jobs said in his famous Stanford commencement address, “The only way to do great work is to love what you do.” Well, yes, that’s an easy thing to agree with—who wouldn’t want a life in which you get to find those things you love and then turn them into a contribution so valuable that people will actually pay you to do what you love? And it’s an easy thing to say to anyone just starting out in their career, or thinking about a career change. It just rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it. “Find what you love, and do it!” The hard part is the doing. Of course, you want a life in which you get to do a lot of what you love. You have within you so much energy, so much insight, so much power, so much joy. You don’t want to get to the end of your life and look back and realize that you didn’t get to feel any of it. You want to get to the end and look back and know—deep in the very heart of you—that no matter how much money you made or didn’t make, you lived a first-rate version of your very own life, rather than a second-rate version of somebody else’s.
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We know this because when we survey a group of people who are highly successful, resilient, and engaged and a contrast group of people who are less so, the two best questions to separate them are these: Do you have a chance to play to your strengths every day? Were you excited to go to work every day last week? Those people who are thriving answer “strongly agree” to both of these. Every single day they report that they get to do something that plays to the best of themselves, something that gets them excited. Not all day. Not everything. Just some things—but every day. They don’t necessarily “do all they love.” Instead, they find the love in what they do. Every day.
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What can be far harder is when you see someone you love losing themselves. Have you had that experience? You can deal with whatever life throws at you, but when someone you love reveals the pain they’re going through, or the abuse they’ve suffered, you find yourself ambushed by wave upon wave of emotion. Shock, as you try to make sense of what you’re hearing. Confusion, as you try to reconcile this past pain with the person sitting in front of you, the person you thought you knew. Rage that this person could be hurt, or could hurt themselves, suffer by themselves, get so lost by themselves, with no one there to help them. Grief, too, that you can’t go back and fix it for them. You want to reach over and squeeze them so tightly that they’ll never feel lost again. You want to find that small, broken part of them and piece it back together and show them that it’s all right now, that the person deep inside is whole again, happy again. It may even be that they now seem fine with it all—but you find yourself waking up at night, replaying their suffering, weeping silently at 3 a.m. at how desolate they must have felt, how desperately alone.
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At home, your parents too appeared to have been drawn into this loveless world, worrying about the questions of growing up: What percentile was your weight, your height, what grade level were you reading at, how was your emotional intelligence at birthday parties? So many new questions, almost as if your parents were being rated on your ability to be a normal, well-adjusted, ninetieth-percentile child. Through your actions, their reputations were at risk. Their love for who you really were turned into fear of who you really were, and whether you would measure up. Whether they would measure up.
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Here in the world of work, you were now introduced to: Goals imposed on you from above Detailed job descriptions that define the required skills for the optimal job candidate Feedback tools that give your peers and boss the right to judge you against this list of required skills—and, if you are found to be missing a few of them, that lead to yet more skills training to fill up your vessel Performance reviews that measure you against these skills and give you a year-end rating and an individual development plan to record how you need to do better next year Career paths that prescribe the few routes you are allowed to use to climb the ladder Concepts such as “growth mindset,” which seem benign initially, but in essence tell you that there’s nothing unique inside your vessel, and that success for you will come only if you believe that you can pour anything into your vessel if you have enough “grit” or “deliberate practice”
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You’re coasting along, doing fine, the job’s manageable, the bank account’s relatively healthy, but something’s missing. The vinyl record is spinning on the turntable, but the needle isn’t touching the grooves. You put in your time at work, but it’s the company’s time, not your time. You’re short-tempered and you don’t know why. Your successes at work feel hollow and you don’t know why. You find yourself resenting the praise you get at work, the knowledge you gain, even the money you make. You low-key resent it all. And you don’t know why.
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It’s a strangely awful feeling, isn’t it. As if you’re a passenger in your own life, watching the world slide by, without ever getting out and taking action in it.
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Where you have already displayed some natural ease, appetite, and ability, here you will experience the greatest learning and growth. And where you’ve struggled, found little love or joy, here you will grow the least.
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Anything of value you offer to others is your work. Your life, lived fully, is the search for the strongest possible connection between what you feel—your loves—and what you give to others—your work.
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The energy of the one fuels the energy of the other. Thus, the only way you’ll make a lasting contribution in life is to deeply understand what it is that you love. And the inverse: you’ll never live a life you love unless you deeply understand how to contribute to others. In this sense, the true purpose of your work is to help you discover that which you love: work is for love. And the purpose of love is to help you learn where and how you can contribute: love is for work.
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At its simplest this means start paying attention to what you find yourself paying attention to. Yes, school and work are going to force you to focus on certain subjects and classes, but can you find a way to filter out some of their noise? Can you, instead, catch sight of yourself catching sight of something? Something unprompted by anyone else. Something that you see, that makes you laugh or intrigues you. Something that others, when you describe it to them, may not quite understand. Something that, when you’re alone—late at night, early in the morning, walking someplace—you find popping unbidden into your mind.
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But only you know which activities you’re instinctively drawn to, and which ones you aren’t. Your life keeps sending hundreds of thousands of signals your way—in the form of actions, people, situations—and you are the sole judge of which of these you can’t help but pick up on. You are the wisest person in your world.
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So ask yourself, “What do I find myself instinctively raising my hand for?” Left entirely to your own devices, which activities or situations seem to pull you toward them? Block out all the other voices and demands in your world, and see what your answers are. No matter the answers, they’ll be meaningful. Honor yourself by listening to them.
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When you’re doing an activity you love, the same thing happens. You get so deeply connected to what you’re doing that the moments flow together, smooth, easy, inevitable. You don’t experience the activity as a sequence of defined steps, separated from you, outside of you, one taken and completed before the next is taken. Instead, the activity seems to meld with you, and you experience it from the inside out. As if it’s a part of you. It’s hard to describe this feeling, but we’ve all had it. When we are inside an activity we love we are enveloped, so in the moment that we are no longer aware of ourselves. You are not doing the activity. You are the activity. The late, eminent positive psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called this feeling flow and said it was the secret to happiness.
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When was the last time … … you lost track of time? … you instinctively volunteered for something? … someone had to tear you away from what you were doing? … you felt completely in control of what you were doing? … you surprised yourself by how well you did? … you were singled out for praise? … you were the only person to notice something? … you found yourself actively looking forward to work? … you came up with a new way of doing things? … you wanted the activity to never end? Try to answer each question instantaneously, off the top of your head, as it were. Don’t overthink it or intellectualize it. Just come up with the last time you felt each of these ten feelings. You might write down the date or the time, but more important, write down what you were doing. Which activities created in you these specific sorts of experiences? What you are looking for here are the patterns. I doubt you will list ten different activities. Instead, more than likely, you’ll find some overlap between your answers. Perhaps the last time you were singled out for praise was also the last time you lost track of time. Or maybe the last time you came up with a new way of doing things was also the last time you never wanted the activity to end.
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Recent research by the Mayo Clinic into the well-being of doctors and nurses reveals that 20 percent is the threshold level: spend at least 20 percent of your time at work doing specific activities you love and you are far less likely to experience burnout. Research by colleagues at the ADP Research Institute reinforces this finding. According to their recent global study of twenty-five thousand workers, if you have a chance to do something you love each and every day (even if you aren’t good at it yet), you are 3.6 times more likely to be highly resilient.
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So, yes, love matters, but you don’t need to love all you do. You just need to find the love in what you do. And as the Mayo Clinic research reveals, even a little love goes a long, long way.
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It just means that along the way you will happen upon some activities that come so easily to you, it’s as if you’ve found a shortcut. You pick them up so fast, they feel so natural, that you don’t need the steps and the sequence and all those mechanics. You need just one exposure to the skill, and wham, you’re off to the races. It just clicks. This “clicking” may happen very early in life, or further along in your career. Hopefully, you’ll try many different activities and roles during the course of your life, but whatever you try, keep your feelings alert for when everything just clicks, when you pick up the new skill faster than you should. It’s a sign you’ve found love. Rapid learning and love, they’re linked.
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When you instinctively lobby for that promotion only because it comes with a bigger salary, this is a mis-instinct. When you go for the job simply because it comes with a bigger title, this is a mis-instinct. When you opt for the posting only because it comes with more prestige, this is a mis-instinct. For your loves to turn into contribution, pay attention only to the specific activities you love, not the outcomes of those activities. Pay attention to what you are going to be doing, rather than why. “What,” in the end, always trumps the “why.” Ask yourself: In this role, what precisely will I be paid to do? Ask yourself: What will a regular week in this new role look like? Ask yourself: What will I be doing at 9 a.m. on a normal Wednesday morning, or 3 p.m. on a Friday afternoon? As part of my ongoing research into excellent performers in various roles, I’ve posed to the best salespeople this question: “What do you love most about selling?” Imagine all the possible answers you might hear from salespeople in response to this question. “I love building trust.” “I love trying to explain the benefits of what I’m offering.” “I love meeting lots of interesting people.” Or the most common: “I love selling things I really believe in. I can’t sell anything I don’t really believe in.” It turns out that the best salespeople say none of these things. Well, they might also say one of these things, but what all the best salespeople say is this: “I love the close.” For the best salespeople, the love of the job lies not in why they are selling the product, nor in whom they are selling it to or with. Instead, it lies in the actual activity of the close. Of finally getting someone to do something tangible: sign on the dotted line. In the broadest sense, this activity, of getting another human to commit, is what all the best salespeople love about what they do. Of course, the details matter. They all may love different aspects of it—one may close through persuasion, one through technical competence, one through rapport. But the activity that fills up their every day with love is the activity of getting the close.
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pay close attention to other people’s reactions. These reactions will be excellent raw material to help you understand the dent you are making in the world. When someone’s reaction wasn’t quite what you wanted, honor their reaction and then think through which actions of yours they were reacting to. Even more important, when someone’s reaction was exactly what you wanted—they loved your call, your email, your presentation, your singing voice—spend a ton of time being curious with them about their reaction. Ask them why they felt the way they did, what worked for them, when they leaned in, what grabbed their attention. You’re doing this not to fish for praise, but to learn more and more about who you are when you are at your best. You are using their reaction to what worked to become ever more expert at turning your loves into contribution. But whatever you do, don’t listen to others’ feedback and advice. Well, you can listen, just don’t act on it. You will always be your most productive and attractive when you’re inside your own skin. When you squeeze yourself inside someone else’s, you’re just plain scary.
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Try to change your relationship to your fears. Don’t banish them. Don’t fight them. Don’t turn and face them down. Instead, see whether you can learn to honor your fears—which means listening to them, being curious about them, and admiring them as part of the real you. Do this—gently, generously, kindly—and they will show you what you truly love. On your journey, you’re told to dismiss your fears, to confront your fears, to step outside of your comfort zone. Yet this is all so misleading. Your big choice in life is not “comfort or no comfort.” It is “love or no love.” When you step into things you love, you will feel fear. That’s not just OK, it’s fundamental. So fundamental, in fact, that if you’re doing something and you feel no fear, then you’ve lost your love. So, take the path of fear, because the path of fear is the path of love.
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To help you see yourself for the unique creature you are, begin by resisting the pull of comparison. This is easy to write, and so very hard to do. Our entire systems of parenting, of schooling, of social media, and of working have been designed to force you to compare all aspects of you with your peers.
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But try to resist the temptation to copy or compare yourself with others’ methods. Their way is not your way, and never will be. Other people’s methods are a mystery to you, as yours are to them. The best way forward for you is to admire the contribution of others and then figure out your most instinctive and authentic way of achieving that same outcome. Don’t compare your way of selling, serving, writing, presenting, or leading with others’, because you will lose yourself in the comparison. Instead, seek your path of least resistance to that same outcome.
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Instead, a healthy life is one where you are in motion, where you are moving through life—all aspects of your life—in such a way that you draw strength and love from it, and this then gives you the energy you need to keep moving. This means to live happily and fully, you have to express your loves. Yes, they spring from within you, but then they demand expression. You’ve got to get them out somewhere, somehow, turn them from loves into actions, from passions into contributions. And when you do, your life feels coherent and authentic, and you know, you just know, in every fiber of your being, that you are on your path.
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In your quiet moments you ask yourself, Where did I go? What’s wrong with me? I don’t think I recognize me anymore. I don’t think I like me anymore. It’s the oddest feeling, isn’t it. Love seems like such a positive emotion—it opens you up, bringing you new ideas, a generous spirit, a collaborative heart—and yet, love unexpressed transforms into a caustic, abrasive thing, withering you from the inside. Your loves—the very things that can elevate and reveal the very best of you—can, when bottled up, burn away any signs of who you really are and turn you into a husk of a person.
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Love, in any relationship, is not protection—it is not someone reaching in and saving you from yourself. Love is not diversity—it is not someone complementing your personality with different strengths. Love is not similarity—it is not someone sharing your interests, or values, or dreams. Love is someone seeing the fullness of you and wanting you to be the best possible version of you. This is what a relationship is for—any relationship, whether friend, business partner, sibling, or lover. It is for each person to do all they can to help the other express their uniqueness as powerfully as possible. Love’s goal is to make the other person bigger. You do not need the other person to love what you love. You need only for them to love that you love what you love, and to want to help you turn your loves into contribution. All of this starts with them seeing you. Because they cannot love what they cannot see.
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We know this because when we survey a group of people who are highly successful, resilient, and engaged and a contrast group of people who are less so, the two best questions to separate them are these: Do you have a chance to play to your strengths every day? Were you excited to go to work every day last week? Those people who are thriving answer “strongly agree” to both of these. Every single day they report that they get to do something that plays to the best of themselves, something that gets them excited. Not all day. Not everything. Just some things—but every day. They don’t necessarily “do all they love.” Instead, they find the love in what they do. Every day.
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What can be far harder is when you see someone you love losing themselves. Have you had that experience? You can deal with whatever life throws at you, but when someone you love reveals the pain they’re going through, or the abuse they’ve suffered, you find yourself ambushed by wave upon wave of emotion. Shock, as you try to make sense of what you’re hearing. Confusion, as you try to reconcile this past pain with the person sitting in front of you, the person you thought you knew. Rage that this person could be hurt, or could hurt themselves, suffer by themselves, get so lost by themselves, with no one there to help them. Grief, too, that you can’t go back and fix it for them. You want to reach over and squeeze them so tightly that they’ll never feel lost again. You want to find that small, broken part of them and piece it back together and show them that it’s all right now, that the person deep inside is whole again, happy again. It may even be that they now seem fine with it all—but you find yourself waking up at night, replaying their suffering, weeping silently at 3 a.m. at how desolate they must have felt, how desperately alone.
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At home, your parents too appeared to have been drawn into this loveless world, worrying about the questions of growing up: What percentile was your weight, your height, what grade level were you reading at, how was your emotional intelligence at birthday parties? So many new questions, almost as if your parents were being rated on your ability to be a normal, well-adjusted, ninetieth-percentile child. Through your actions, their reputations were at risk. Their love for who you really were turned into fear of who you really were, and whether you would measure up. Whether they would measure up.
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Here in the world of work, you were now introduced to: Goals imposed on you from above Detailed job descriptions that define the required skills for the optimal job candidate Feedback tools that give your peers and boss the right to judge you against this list of required skills—and, if you are found to be missing a few of them, that lead to yet more skills training to fill up your vessel Performance reviews that measure you against these skills and give you a year-end rating and an individual development plan to record how you need to do better next year Career paths that prescribe the few routes you are allowed to use to climb the ladder Concepts such as “growth mindset,” which seem benign initially, but in essence tell you that there’s nothing unique inside your vessel, and that success for you will come only if you believe that you can pour anything into your vessel if you have enough “grit” or “deliberate practice”
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You’re coasting along, doing fine, the job’s manageable, the bank account’s relatively healthy, but something’s missing. The vinyl record is spinning on the turntable, but the needle isn’t touching the grooves. You put in your time at work, but it’s the company’s time, not your time. You’re short-tempered and you don’t know why. Your successes at work feel hollow and you don’t know why. You find yourself resenting the praise you get at work, the knowledge you gain, even the money you make. You low-key resent it all. And you don’t know why.
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It’s a strangely awful feeling, isn’t it. As if you’re a passenger in your own life, watching the world slide by, without ever getting out and taking action in it.
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Where you have already displayed some natural ease, appetite, and ability, here you will experience the greatest learning and growth. And where you’ve struggled, found little love or joy, here you will grow the least.
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Anything of value you offer to others is your work. Your life, lived fully, is the search for the strongest possible connection between what you feel—your loves—and what you give to others—your work.
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The energy of the one fuels the energy of the other. Thus, the only way you’ll make a lasting contribution in life is to deeply understand what it is that you love. And the inverse: you’ll never live a life you love unless you deeply understand how to contribute to others. In this sense, the true purpose of your work is to help you discover that which you love: work is for love. And the purpose of love is to help you learn where and how you can contribute: love is for work.
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At its simplest this means start paying attention to what you find yourself paying attention to. Yes, school and work are going to force you to focus on certain subjects and classes, but can you find a way to filter out some of their noise? Can you, instead, catch sight of yourself catching sight of something? Something unprompted by anyone else. Something that you see, that makes you laugh or intrigues you. Something that others, when you describe it to them, may not quite understand. Something that, when you’re alone—late at night, early in the morning, walking someplace—you find popping unbidden into your mind.
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But only you know which activities you’re instinctively drawn to, and which ones you aren’t. Your life keeps sending hundreds of thousands of signals your way—in the form of actions, people, situations—and you are the sole judge of which of these you can’t help but pick up on. You are the wisest person in your world.
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So ask yourself, “What do I find myself instinctively raising my hand for?” Left entirely to your own devices, which activities or situations seem to pull you toward them? Block out all the other voices and demands in your world, and see what your answers are. No matter the answers, they’ll be meaningful. Honor yourself by listening to them.
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When you’re doing an activity you love, the same thing happens. You get so deeply connected to what you’re doing that the moments flow together, smooth, easy, inevitable. You don’t experience the activity as a sequence of defined steps, separated from you, outside of you, one taken and completed before the next is taken. Instead, the activity seems to meld with you, and you experience it from the inside out. As if it’s a part of you. It’s hard to describe this feeling, but we’ve all had it. When we are inside an activity we love we are enveloped, so in the moment that we are no longer aware of ourselves. You are not doing the activity. You are the activity. The late, eminent positive psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called this feeling flow and said it was the secret to happiness.
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When was the last time … … you lost track of time? … you instinctively volunteered for something? … someone had to tear you away from what you were doing? … you felt completely in control of what you were doing? … you surprised yourself by how well you did? … you were singled out for praise? … you were the only person to notice something? … you found yourself actively looking forward to work? … you came up with a new way of doing things? … you wanted the activity to never end? Try to answer each question instantaneously, off the top of your head, as it were. Don’t overthink it or intellectualize it. Just come up with the last time you felt each of these ten feelings. You might write down the date or the time, but more important, write down what you were doing. Which activities created in you these specific sorts of experiences? What you are looking for here are the patterns. I doubt you will list ten different activities. Instead, more than likely, you’ll find some overlap between your answers. Perhaps the last time you were singled out for praise was also the last time you lost track of time. Or maybe the last time you came up with a new way of doing things was also the last time you never wanted the activity to end.
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Recent research by the Mayo Clinic into the well-being of doctors and nurses reveals that 20 percent is the threshold level: spend at least 20 percent of your time at work doing specific activities you love and you are far less likely to experience burnout. Research by colleagues at the ADP Research Institute reinforces this finding. According to their recent global study of twenty-five thousand workers, if you have a chance to do something you love each and every day (even if you aren’t good at it yet), you are 3.6 times more likely to be highly resilient.
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So, yes, love matters, but you don’t need to love all you do. You just need to find the love in what you do. And as the Mayo Clinic research reveals, even a little love goes a long, long way.
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It just means that along the way you will happen upon some activities that come so easily to you, it’s as if you’ve found a shortcut. You pick them up so fast, they feel so natural, that you don’t need the steps and the sequence and all those mechanics. You need just one exposure to the skill, and wham, you’re off to the races. It just clicks. This “clicking” may happen very early in life, or further along in your career. Hopefully, you’ll try many different activities and roles during the course of your life, but whatever you try, keep your feelings alert for when everything just clicks, when you pick up the new skill faster than you should. It’s a sign you’ve found love. Rapid learning and love, they’re linked.
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When you instinctively lobby for that promotion only because it comes with a bigger salary, this is a mis-instinct. When you go for the job simply because it comes with a bigger title, this is a mis-instinct. When you opt for the posting only because it comes with more prestige, this is a mis-instinct. For your loves to turn into contribution, pay attention only to the specific activities you love, not the outcomes of those activities. Pay attention to what you are going to be doing, rather than why. “What,” in the end, always trumps the “why.” Ask yourself: In this role, what precisely will I be paid to do? Ask yourself: What will a regular week in this new role look like? Ask yourself: What will I be doing at 9 a.m. on a normal Wednesday morning, or 3 p.m. on a Friday afternoon? As part of my ongoing research into excellent performers in various roles, I’ve posed to the best salespeople this question: “What do you love most about selling?” Imagine all the possible answers you might hear from salespeople in response to this question. “I love building trust.” “I love trying to explain the benefits of what I’m offering.” “I love meeting lots of interesting people.” Or the most common: “I love selling things I really believe in. I can’t sell anything I don’t really believe in.” It turns out that the best salespeople say none of these things. Well, they might also say one of these things, but what all the best salespeople say is this: “I love the close.” For the best salespeople, the love of the job lies not in why they are selling the product, nor in whom they are selling it to or with. Instead, it lies in the actual activity of the close. Of finally getting someone to do something tangible: sign on the dotted line. In the broadest sense, this activity, of getting another human to commit, is what all the best salespeople love about what they do. Of course, the details matter. They all may love different aspects of it—one may close through persuasion, one through technical competence, one through rapport. But the activity that fills up their every day with love is the activity of getting the close.
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pay close attention to other people’s reactions. These reactions will be excellent raw material to help you understand the dent you are making in the world. When someone’s reaction wasn’t quite what you wanted, honor their reaction and then think through which actions of yours they were reacting to. Even more important, when someone’s reaction was exactly what you wanted—they loved your call, your email, your presentation, your singing voice—spend a ton of time being curious with them about their reaction. Ask them why they felt the way they did, what worked for them, when they leaned in, what grabbed their attention. You’re doing this not to fish for praise, but to learn more and more about who you are when you are at your best. You are using their reaction to what worked to become ever more expert at turning your loves into contribution. But whatever you do, don’t listen to others’ feedback and advice. Well, you can listen, just don’t act on it. You will always be your most productive and attractive when you’re inside your own skin. When you squeeze yourself inside someone else’s, you’re just plain scary.
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Try to change your relationship to your fears. Don’t banish them. Don’t fight them. Don’t turn and face them down. Instead, see whether you can learn to honor your fears—which means listening to them, being curious about them, and admiring them as part of the real you. Do this—gently, generously, kindly—and they will show you what you truly love. On your journey, you’re told to dismiss your fears, to confront your fears, to step outside of your comfort zone. Yet this is all so misleading. Your big choice in life is not “comfort or no comfort.” It is “love or no love.” When you step into things you love, you will feel fear. That’s not just OK, it’s fundamental. So fundamental, in fact, that if you’re doing something and you feel no fear, then you’ve lost your love. So, take the path of fear, because the path of fear is the path of love.
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To help you see yourself for the unique creature you are, begin by resisting the pull of comparison. This is easy to write, and so very hard to do. Our entire systems of parenting, of schooling, of social media, and of working have been designed to force you to compare all aspects of you with your peers.
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But try to resist the temptation to copy or compare yourself with others’ methods. Their way is not your way, and never will be. Other people’s methods are a mystery to you, as yours are to them. The best way forward for you is to admire the contribution of others and then figure out your most instinctive and authentic way of achieving that same outcome. Don’t compare your way of selling, serving, writing, presenting, or leading with others’, because you will lose yourself in the comparison. Instead, seek your path of least resistance to that same outcome.
==========
Instead, a healthy life is one where you are in motion, where you are moving through life—all aspects of your life—in such a way that you draw strength and love from it, and this then gives you the energy you need to keep moving. This means to live happily and fully, you have to express your loves. Yes, they spring from within you, but then they demand expression. You’ve got to get them out somewhere, somehow, turn them from loves into actions, from passions into contributions. And when you do, your life feels coherent and authentic, and you know, you just know, in every fiber of your being, that you are on your path.
==========
In your quiet moments you ask yourself, Where did I go? What’s wrong with me? I don’t think I recognize me anymore. I don’t think I like me anymore. It’s the oddest feeling, isn’t it. Love seems like such a positive emotion—it opens you up, bringing you new ideas, a generous spirit, a collaborative heart—and yet, love unexpressed transforms into a caustic, abrasive thing, withering you from the inside. Your loves—the very things that can elevate and reveal the very best of you—can, when bottled up, burn away any signs of who you really are and turn you into a husk of a person.
==========
Love, in any relationship, is not protection—it is not someone reaching in and saving you from yourself. Love is not diversity—it is not someone complementing your personality with different strengths. Love is not similarity—it is not someone sharing your interests, or values, or dreams. Love is someone seeing the fullness of you and wanting you to be the best possible version of you. This is what a relationship is for—any relationship, whether friend, business partner, sibling, or lover. It is for each person to do all they can to help the other express their uniqueness as powerfully as possible. Love’s goal is to make the other person bigger. You do not need the other person to love what you love. You need only for them to love that you love what you love, and to want to help you turn your loves into contribution. All of this starts with them seeing you. Because they cannot love what they cannot see.
October 5, 2023
Exactly what I needed at this moment in time!
April 22, 2022
I absolutely LOVE this book. So affirming for me. There are so many great actionable items for your work and life. This should be required reading!
Favorite quote:
"Love is someone seeing the fullness of you and wanting you to be the best possible version of you. This is what a relationship is for--any relationship, whether friend, business partner, sibling or lover. It is for each person to do all they can to help the other express their uniqueness as powerfully as possible. Love's goal is to make the other person bigger."
Favorite quote:
"Love is someone seeing the fullness of you and wanting you to be the best possible version of you. This is what a relationship is for--any relationship, whether friend, business partner, sibling or lover. It is for each person to do all they can to help the other express their uniqueness as powerfully as possible. Love's goal is to make the other person bigger."
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