When I graduated from business school (believing full well I would never use that degree in its intended capacity…or at all), I was always chasing something. At times it was a fat salary because…hello? Other times, I was sprinting, trying to catch up to clout, wanting a title and awards so I could be recognized and treated like I was somebody worth knowing. Until I’d hit enough roadblocks, rock bottoms, and burnout to stop and take inventory of who I was and what I actually wanted.
It’s one of the things that I appreciate and respect about getting older - the wisdom to reflect and make different choices. Hell, even just gaining the full understanding that you can, in fact, make a different choice!
When I achieved any or all of those things I was clamoring for, there was very little in my life that they satiated. A good salary definitely helped ease financial stress, but beyond that, I got the awards, the bylines, and I work with the big names, and it all just pointed to something else. Something much less physically tangible. I wanted freedom. I wanted alignment. I deeply needed joy.
These are the career goals I’m chasing now. Quiet ones. Soulful ones. The kind that don’t necessarily show up in the LinkedIn headline but wonderfully shape an entire life.
1. Creating Work That Aligns With My Purpose & Life’s Mission
I’m not just running after jobs. I’m committed to making things that feel spiritually, culturally, and emotionally real and true. For me that’s within my creative work as a producer, voice artist, performer and writer but it can be anything you know you’re meant to put out into the world. It’s the work that you care about, that reflects your values and your voice.
The key here is to live intentionally enough and become reflective and courageous enough to get clear on what your values are and the tone, direction, and purpose of your voice is.
→ Universal goal: Doing work that aligns with personal purpose and values.
2. Telling Stories That Uplift and Represent Humanity Fully
In my daily work I center people who are wrestling for something better, something good. Sometimes they win. Other times they fall short. Often they look like me. Sometimes they don’t. But the point of it all has become increasingly clear: This is about authentic representation and narrative repair - showing these beautiful, flawed, and trying people as the complex, divine, joyful and whole beings that they are.
→ Universal goal: Using one’s skills to elevate underrepresented voices and truths.
3. Building Sustainable, Soul-Fulfilling Workflows
Now, I can say this one I am actively working on as if I’m trying to learn calculus! It doesn’t come easy, designing a life that gives me time for my spirit, my people, my rest, and my growth. And still, I know how I feel when I get it right and I am chasing that feeling until it’s a state of being. Because many of us know what burnout looks, sounds, and feels like and we don’t want to keep playing with it for the rest of our lives.
→ Universal goal: Crafting a career that allows space for life, health, and wholeness.
4. Creating Opportunities For Others
What is the actual point of doing most things if not anything if it doesn’t benefit even just one other person? I may not - at present - be building conglomerations that will employ thousands but I can write a story that will cause someone to feel understood. I can get on a call with someone who wants to do what I do and give them some starting points, connect them with resources. I value creating models of what’s possible more than papers or trophies.
→ Universal goal: Building something that outlasts you and benefits others.
5. Mastering The Craft with Integrity and Joy
I enjoy the work I do and appreciate the opportunity to get to do it that I am always thinking about excellence. Not just the look of doing it well but actually putting the time in to do what I do well. I don’t want to just appear great, I want to be great at what I do. I want to enjoy it enough that putting in those hours of learning and practice and execution and review and planning feel a little less taxing than if I loathed my path. Ain’t no more faking the funk.
→ Universal goal: Becoming excellent at something meaningful, while staying true to oneself.
6. Building Deep, Respectful Creative Collaborations
No matter what social media shows, you can’t go it alone. And the only way to go up together is to connect and collaborate with solid people with common interests and values. The work I’ve been blessed to do has allowed me to forge partnerships and lifelong collaborative relationships with people I trust and admire and vice versa. This means so much more than chasing the next award because just think…that award may be sitting on your shelf but can you call it up with an idea and be met with enthusiasm and excitement to start planning how to make it happen? Creating beautiful and honest work can happen when you’re by yourself, sure. But building a track record of working well with others is priceless.
→ Universal goal: Working with people who bring out your best and treat you with mutual respect.
7. Staying Rooted in Faith While Navigating Ambition
There is nothing more important to me than growing in my faith practice and relationship with God. It took time for that to be the case. I was way more concerned with what other people thought of me, could do for me, and said about me on my career journey for a very long time. But now I understand from lots of experience that if my spiritual compass is off, nothing I do will matter. I have to stay grounded. I have to stay centered. I have to keep the main thing, the main thing. View of the path may get hazy and opportunities may be incredibly shiny but who I answer to and the divine purpose of it all has got to be front and center. Not ego, not fear, but pure faith.
→ Universal goal: Letting faith, ethics, or inner wisdom guide one’s professional path.
8. Healing Through the Work—For Yourself and Others
Whether it’s unpacking emotional layers in fiction or staging a monologue show that moves a room, you use art and audio as a healing medium. You're not afraid to go deep. You want to make people feel.
→ Universal goal: Using work as a channel for healing, transformation, or emotional resonance.
9. Being Seen and Valued for Your Full Creative Range
I tried a few different career paths early on my career journey and each time, I made that one thing my whole personality and identity. When I taught, it was all I was. When I worked for a nonprofit that was all I talked about. As I recognized that the creative space, generally, is where i belong I have learned to leave room for more. If I was created to be creative (as we all are, but that’s a discussion for another time) then I must make space for myself to become.
I crave to be known for more than just one thing because there are so many ideas percolating inside me.
Yes, I produce. Yes, I am a voice actor. Yes, I narrate audiobooks. AND I have other irons in the fire. It’s a mistake to be held in one place when there is so much room in this life for you to run, walk, skip into different spaces. We don’t have to shrink to fit. We don’t have to contort ourselves to be poured into a mold. It’s high time we break it and allow the world to know us from all sides.
→ Universal goal: Having the freedom to show up as whole and multi-dimensional.
Let’s make things inbox official! Sign up for the xoNecole newsletter for love, wellness, career, and exclusive content delivered straight to your inbox.
Featured image by Shutterstock
