careers

There’s no denying that women have made great strides since the days when Joan Cleaver dominated our stereotype. Today’s women can have it all—a successful and demanding career, a passionate, healthy marriage, and a rewarding home life complete with 2.3 children and a white picket fence. We can be power CEO’s during the day and domestic queens by night. Or can we? Women’s Liberation gave this freedom to women, but as we learned in the late 80’s from Hochschild and Machung and their theory of the Second Shift, this isn’t quite the emancipation we had imagined. In Dropping the Ball, Chief

Hoda Kotb, winner of a Daytime Emmy Award as part of The Today Show, has penned Where We Belong, a collection of stories about people who were feeling unfulfilled, yet were able to get things back on track by simply following their own desires and passions. While some of the examples she shares are about extraordinary people with money and connections, there are also instances of everyday people with seemingly nothing more than a burning ambition to change their lives and the lives of others for the better.

You’ll come away inspired and testing your own feelings and asking yourself if you are

In Working Stiff, Judy Melinek provides a fascinating look into the work of a New York City medical examiner. Never sensational, Melinek describes some of the more interesting autopsies she’s performed, how she dealt with the families of the deceased, and cases that landed her at crime scenes and in courtrooms—all surprising aspects of this occupation that I had never considered.

The grueling, heartbreaking, and necessary work of her office during and after 9/11 is undeniable. And Melinek shares her role in those events openly and honestly. While a successful medical examiner must hold her

Did you have a clear passion that could easily be translated into real, money-making work as a child or teenager?  Do you even have that kind of defined, this is my calling passion now?  Most of us don’t.  And hobbies don’t count (unless they make you a living).  Cal Newport, in his newest book So Good They Can't Ignore You, argues that passion does not come first, despite all of the career related advice that encourages people to find their passion before committing to a career.

Newport argues any job can produce the kind of satisfaction and fulfillment we often think can only come from the