Does Your Work Still Excite You

Follow your passion or Follow the money

In an ideal world, we would be doing meaningful work with the people we choose to work with. We would work where we want and when we want.

Oh yeah, this isn’t an ideal world. The above is the reality for a small minority of people. For most people, they work in situations they want to run away from…because, oh yeah, you need this pesky thing called money.

Money pays for your groceries, internet, gas, rent, mortgage, and anything else you need (and want). Without money, you’ll be a huge ball of stress and won’t think about anything else. With money, you’ll be able to focus on other aspects of your life that you find meaningful and enjoyable.

Silly Corporate Buzzwords

Since the pandemic, we’ve started to hear these silly buzzwords get thrown around. There’s “quiet quitting” and “quiet firing”. Then the even more silly “quiet hiring”…huh? Then the grand finale….we’ve all heard of the “Great Resignation”.

All of this points to everyone’s awareness of work and how it correlates to their life. Life is short. Trying to find work you enjoy is a very meaningful undertaking. Why not? Why not you? There is still time.

Side Hustle vs. Full Hustle

If you break your 24-hour day into thirds…that’s 8 hours for sleep, 8 hours for work, and 8 hours for everything else. So you’ll roughly spend a third of your life working. That’s a very long time. Wouldn’t it be nice to spend that third of your life doing something you love (like or kinda like).

One way to dip your toe in the water is to try a side hustle. This can be anything. Writing, painting, YouTube, woodwork, etc. If your side hustle takes off it might become your full hustle.

This can give you more agency over your life. Build your own dream and vision over building someone else’s. According to NPR, a 2022 Gallup survey of around 67,000 people showed that only 32% of workers are engaged with their work. That’s a problem.

Final Thoughts

The default path for most people is picking anything that provides a paycheck. There is a time and place for this path, but don’t let this become your entire life.

At some point, you have to stop and try to do your own thing. Figure out what makes you tick. Figure out what your unique talents are that only you can do and try to make that your life’s work.