Many people do not know the pleasure of working and understand that work is what occupies the space between our leisure time and pleasure on the weekends. For many professionals, work becomes a tedious activity to achieve a single objective: an income at the end of the month that allows you to pay your expenses. Many understand that you have to make a sacrifice at work to get money. In short, an exchange of tedium for money.
The definition of work has to do with carrying out activities, with being busy, with having obligations and responsibilities. On the other hand, leisure has to do with doing activities that you like, that are fun for you. Leisure and work seem like oil and water. For many people, totally opposite activities, and that they cannot mix with each other.
But why does it have to be this way? Why can’t work and fun be combined? Why can’t we try to find a job that entertains, attracts, and motivates us? It is clear that people’s happiness levels would rise a lot if they could develop a professional activity that attracts them, motivates them or even makes them passionate. Our society would improve in many aspects because when a person is well on a professional level, it usually has a positive impact on their other areas of life such as their partner or family, health …
In addition, if a person can work in something that he likes and if the person does not consider it as tedium or as a great sacrifice, also entails great benefits at an economic level. In the book “The Millionaire Mind”, its author Thomas J. Stanley – American writer specialized in wealth – shares the conclusions he reaches after having studied and analyzed what the richest people in the world have in common. After his deep and detailed investigation, he discovers that what the wealthiest people have in common is not their level of intelligence, nor the education they have received, nor the sector of activity in which they work … According to Stanley, none of these elements allows predicting the success of a certain person. Stanley affirms that the only characteristic that millionaires have in common is that they all carry out a professional activity that they are passionate about. All of them are passionate about their work, they love to invest time in their professional activity. They do not consider it a deprivation of their leisure or a pleasant activity. On the contrary, they consider their work a real pleasure. As the writer, Thomas Stanley himself says, “If you love, absolutely love what you are doing, chances are excellent that you will succeed”.
This idea reminds me a lot of Steve Jobs. On numerous occasions, Jobs spoke of how work occupies a good part of our lives. Approximately a third part (as a minimum) of our life and for most people, it means more time than they are going to spend with their family, in leisure activities … or even in sleep.
With these premises, wouldn’t it be interesting for you to try to discover what you really like to do and to try as much as possible to look for jobs or responsibilities in the fields or activities that you really love to do? I know it is not easy, especially with the crisis we are experiencing. But why don’t you try it? Why don’t you dare to think about what activities you can enjoy working on and try to go for them? Sometimes it requires professional reinvention (see my post a few months ago “You will have to reinvent yourself”, and also courage and taking some risks (that are calculated). Others involve short-term sacrifices that possibly in the medium and long term will more than compensate you. Dare to try. Because as Steve Jobs himself said, “the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work, and the only way to do great work is to love what to do.”
