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Welcome back to Thank God It’s Monday!
tl;dr The idea of working in a single career for 40+ years in hopes of enjoying retirement is dead. But retirement itself is only a fairly recent concept in the span of human history. The definition of work continues to evolve, and I believe that if you can look beyond the matrix (if you will), work doesn’t have to be the prison sentence people make it out to be. Where is there room in your life to find love in your labor?
First and foremost, I’d like to take this occasion to remind you that Mondays are not inherently bad; they just get a bad reputation among the vast majority of Monday-to-Friday-ers. But I hope you can appreciate this lovely day and, even if only for a brief moment, genuinely consider: Thank God It’s Monday.
This newsletter was started and continues as a love of labor. I felt an unrelenting pull to share some of my life’s adventures and observations, hoping it might help even one person along the way. And all these years later, it continues as a love of the experience: sitting down, sometimes begrudgingly, sometimes passionately, to synthesize my story into cohesive, maybe inspirational, hopefully thought-provoking pages.
Does your work feel similar? Difficult at times, rewarding at others, and a continuous learning process?
And work is not just your job. Work can be your time spent in the garden, or the hours in the kitchen creating meals. I’ll borrow Merriam’s definition of work as “an activity in which one exerts strength or faculties to do or perform something.” So it’s truly any instance of creating or producing (a newsletter, cake, blanket, service, performance, etc).
When we look at when Labor Day was first celebrated back in 1882, work had a much more rigid scope. People worked in harsh conditions in factories or farms, primarily focused on survival (consider that if they got cut on a dirty machine, they predated the discovery of penicillin by 40+ years and had a high chance of dying of an infectious disease). Work was almost solely a means to an end.
Work still largely serves as a means to an end (providing shelter, food, water, and safety for many families) and as a source of discretionary income for everything else after the basic needs. But that doesn’t mean you hate your life for 40 years and hope to enjoy it on the back end.
If we look at life like one long term of servitude, of course we’re going to be miserable. But focusing on the journey and prioritizing what is most important to us can help us find joy and fulfillment.
First, we have to decide what to prioritize. That may be income, quality of life, or a balance of both. It may be benefits associated with a certain job or the opportunity for advancement or independence. But we likely can’t have all of those pillars in one place (if you do, you have certainly found a unicorn job). So pick what’s important, and when work is hard, remind yourself why you’re doing what you do.
Second, and this is where most people get lost, is to move on when a job no longer serves you. The grass might not always be greener, but life is too short to stay in a job that makes you absolutely miserable and is no longer worth the trade-off. Most people would rather deal with the discomfort of what they know than deal with the discomfort of the unknown, and I think this is at the crux of why so many people are miserable.
If you feel like you’re in a rut with work, consider what you would do if you knew you’d die in the next 10 years (not the next 10 days because we’d all tell our bosses to take a hike). You still may need additional income besides what you’ve already put away, so you’d probably still work. But I’d bet you’d only deal with the bare minimum nonsense and certainly not stay in a job that drains you more than it provides you with.
Outside of your job, consider what other “work” you can find as a labor of love. I think a lot of the despondency and anxiety plaguing our culture comes from an imbalance between consuming and producing. Finding work that you can pour your soul into shifts us out of a constant state of consuming and into a state of creating. This refills us with the energy needed to enjoy life.
So no, most of us will not stay in one job and retire at 65 with guaranteed income and pension. But there is beauty in being able to pick and choose our course in life. That may mean dealing with an insufferable boss for a few years or working insane hours. But it also means being able to say when we’re done and ready to move on to the next opportunity. It also gives us the chance to love the work we do, whether that be for a salary or for the joy of creating.
If you found some value in this, please share it with a friend you think would enjoy it! And let me know if you’d like to be added to get TGIM.
This week, my podcast recommendation is from Dan Harris’ 10% Happier, “The Science of Building the Life You Want with Arthur Brooks.”
With that, I’m off on my next adventure!
Until next time,
Shannon
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