So that's why they call it "work"
03.23.2020
“Well, that’s why they call it work. It’s not meant to be fun.”
— John Hamlin
Early in my career, I complained a lot. About everything, but especially about working 9-to-5.
I’d call my father to vent and he’d say, “Well, that’s why they call it work. It’s not meant to be fun.”
This annoyed me—firstly, because what does that even mean? Work is work is work, of course, that’s tautological and true.
But why have we committed ourselves to the idea that work is inherently miserable?
Actually, he had a point. The etymology of the word is closely linked to torture or struggle in every language.
Long have the majority worked to survive.
At some point in our history, work got a glow-up and became a thing of honor. We have this notion of “an honest day’s work,” a puritanical sense of virtue in sweat and toil.
That’s a double-edged sword.
Having a sense of purpose is conducive to human vitality. One commonality of the world’s ‘blue zones’—areas with unusually high numbers of centenarians—is that the residents feel they contribute to meaningfully to their communities. They do meaningful things!
But offering value to society is different from overworking to the point of disease.
Glorification of hustling and grinding makes us sick. In the Western world, chronic low-grade stress lowers our immune systems, making us vulnerable to a host of other health conditions and even changing the brain.
Under stress and over time, the prefontal cortex weakens. The prefontal cortex is what allows you to focus, plan for the future and adapt to your surroundings. What grows stronger under stress? Your amygdala, the fight-or-flight control center.
So the nature of our struggle has changed.
We work in relative luxury—temperature-controlled environments with ergonomic chairs and endless snacks—but struggle persists in the form of our fear response to emails from the boss.
Of course if email is our greatest stressor, we’re fortunate. We’re fortunate in many ways. We have a lot more freedom in how we go about things today than ever before. Witness the rise of remote work, new avenues of generating passive income or the millions of people who earn six figures freelancing.
Even our average working hours have decreased, and that’s a trend predicted to continue into the fourth industrial revolution.
Many are speculating about the rise of automation. Are robots on their way to steal our jobs? Even if so, the empowered choice is to see factors like automation, decentralisation & gig proliferation as invitations.
In this new era of work, we will thrive by being more human. Our uniquely human capacities to be creative, autonomous and resilient will enable us to make the greatest impact on society.
We have an unprecedented opportunity to redefine our relationship to this thing called work.
Do not let chronic busy-ness, imposter syndrome or worries about the future keep you stuck on the lowest value work you could be doing.
Every single person on this planet has value to offer, and that becomes all the more true when we break out of our routine patterns to think deeply and creatively about problems that need to be solved—including in our own lives and careers.
My coaching programs are designed to help you beat stress and distraction, so you can live a more purposeful and satisfying life.
Set up a free strategy session if this appeals to you.