I believe that our attitudes about our work have a direct impact on the bottom line of our fundraising.  When you view work as a necessary evil or something you ‘have’ to do, it comes through in the quality of your work.  When you work because you love your job and care deeply about your cause, it shines through in every newsletter, fundraising letter, and ask you make.

It’s all in how you view things.  Your positive attitude can help you see things in new and different ways. Here’s an example of how I chose to look at work recently.

This weekend, my Mom decided to pick beans from our garden.  Again.  Seems like we’ve picked beans every other day and frankly, I’m tired of it.  I’m grateful that we have such a wonderful garden, but I had other things planned than bending over bean bushes in the blazing heat on Saturday morning.  But, I knew I needed to help her, so out I went.  When the beans were all picked, she decided we better can them because there were so many.  Sigh.  Okay, so I fetched a couple dozen jars from the basement and we started breaking beans.  A good many of them had bug bites and with my trusty knife, I sliced them off. 

Until I picked up this bean:

I instantly yelled “Hey!  Mickey Mouse!”  We started laughing and had to save that bean to show the rest of the family later (doesn’t take much to entertain us!).  We spent the afternoon together and shared a good many laughs.

The point is this:  I didn’t see just another bean with 3 bug bites.  I saw something fun.  Instead of grumbling about having to mess with beans and punt my plans for the day, I was open to what life would bring.  And it brought me a wonderful day spent with my Mom, plus a dozen+ jars of home-grown green beans to eat this winter.

Being willing to be flexible at work is a very valuable trait.  And that willingness stems from a positive attitude about your work. 

What can you do to help yourself be more positive about your work so that you can see something new? 

You never know what you might find!