Its funny how sometimes we start doing something to achieve a goal, but the actions end up taking on a life of their own. I have a friend for example, who made a new year’s resolution a few years back to lose a little bit of weight. She did this because she wanted to live a more robust and balanced lifestyle. Having lost the weight though, her training turned into an obsession. Everything now is about her training schedule and dietry regime.
In her life outside training, nothing has importance anymore. A dinner out cannot be enjoyed as she can’t control what the chef uses as ingredients. Movies are out of the question, “don’t you know how much calories are in the butter they put on popcorn!” and family outings get in the way of her training scedule. She’s lost sight of something.
One of my other friends was the ultimate husband. Everything he did was for the benefit of his wife and home life. His reward for a hard days work was going home to her. She was the reason he went to work, she was the reason for everything he did.
One day he got promoted. Of course he did, he was extremely motivated and professional at work, his wife was his inspiration and the reason for his success. But when he got promoted, something changed. Work wasn’t about providing for his family anymore, it grew a life of its own. All of a sudden, power and the career ladder were the only things he could see.
To my mind, both these friends have lost their way. They have forgotten about the real things in their lives, the important things. They have gotten so caught up in an idea, they’ve lost all balance. They’ve became slaves to it.
In the first case, an effort to live a healthier and fuller life twisted around and on top of itself, into a situation where there is no room for the life she originally wanted. In the second case, the family which were the inspiration for success ended up being regarded as a competing interest for the time which could have been spent in the office.
In the history of mankind, work for the sake of work was reserved to a societal underclass we call slaves. Other people only used to work to support themselves. Once they had achieved this, they enjoyed their lives with their family and friends. The concept of career is so new in the history of mankind, it can almost be called an aberration. Yet the majority of people we know get sucked into its myth, a myth where work is the end in its own right. As a result, people continue to confuse the means to an end, with the end itself.
Have a look at your own life. This is something I do all the time. Is there anything you seem to be dedicating yourself to, that really should be a means to a higher purpose. Is there anything you working on for the sake of the work, rather than the benefits that work should bring?
If there is, have you enslaved yourself to an idea? Ask yourself this. How will you look back at the endeavour in 20 years? Will it be something which made your life better or will it be something that stifled your life, resulting in missed opportunities and time not spent with loved ones?
If you have become a slave to something, its probably because you have lost sight of the important things in your life. So take a weekend off whatever you are working on and spend it reviewing what is important to you. While doing this, make sure you separate out the things that are important to your boss, or trainer, as their goals are not yours. They have vested interests in manipulating your goals to be in line with theirs.
If you do this exercise properly, you should end up with a list of things which are benefits of your toil, not part of the work itself. And they should be things that enhance your life. The goals of the company you work for should not be on your list. So a career goal could be early retirement, or an annual holiday to a remote part of the world. A fitness goal could be climbing to base camp Everest. Meeting a project deadline, or doing more repetitions at a higher weight are the type of thing which should NOT be on your list.
Going through this type of process, if done properly, will give you perspective. Once you have it, you will be in control of your life again. And being back in control, you’ll see work or training is there to support a higher purpose. And from here, you’ll have a vantage point from which you can recognise better methods, and oppotunities to find a better path to your goals. You won’t be stuck, trapped as a slave to your ideas.
In her life outside training, nothing has importance anymore. A dinner out cannot be enjoyed as she can’t control what the chef uses as ingredients. Movies are out of the question, “don’t you know how much calories are in the butter they put on popcorn!” and family outings get in the way of her training scedule. She’s lost sight of something.
One of my other friends was the ultimate husband. Everything he did was for the benefit of his wife and home life. His reward for a hard days work was going home to her. She was the reason he went to work, she was the reason for everything he did.
One day he got promoted. Of course he did, he was extremely motivated and professional at work, his wife was his inspiration and the reason for his success. But when he got promoted, something changed. Work wasn’t about providing for his family anymore, it grew a life of its own. All of a sudden, power and the career ladder were the only things he could see.
To my mind, both these friends have lost their way. They have forgotten about the real things in their lives, the important things. They have gotten so caught up in an idea, they’ve lost all balance. They’ve became slaves to it.
In the first case, an effort to live a healthier and fuller life twisted around and on top of itself, into a situation where there is no room for the life she originally wanted. In the second case, the family which were the inspiration for success ended up being regarded as a competing interest for the time which could have been spent in the office.
In the history of mankind, work for the sake of work was reserved to a societal underclass we call slaves. Other people only used to work to support themselves. Once they had achieved this, they enjoyed their lives with their family and friends. The concept of career is so new in the history of mankind, it can almost be called an aberration. Yet the majority of people we know get sucked into its myth, a myth where work is the end in its own right. As a result, people continue to confuse the means to an end, with the end itself.
Have a look at your own life. This is something I do all the time. Is there anything you seem to be dedicating yourself to, that really should be a means to a higher purpose. Is there anything you working on for the sake of the work, rather than the benefits that work should bring?
If there is, have you enslaved yourself to an idea? Ask yourself this. How will you look back at the endeavour in 20 years? Will it be something which made your life better or will it be something that stifled your life, resulting in missed opportunities and time not spent with loved ones?
If you have become a slave to something, its probably because you have lost sight of the important things in your life. So take a weekend off whatever you are working on and spend it reviewing what is important to you. While doing this, make sure you separate out the things that are important to your boss, or trainer, as their goals are not yours. They have vested interests in manipulating your goals to be in line with theirs.
If you do this exercise properly, you should end up with a list of things which are benefits of your toil, not part of the work itself. And they should be things that enhance your life. The goals of the company you work for should not be on your list. So a career goal could be early retirement, or an annual holiday to a remote part of the world. A fitness goal could be climbing to base camp Everest. Meeting a project deadline, or doing more repetitions at a higher weight are the type of thing which should NOT be on your list.
Going through this type of process, if done properly, will give you perspective. Once you have it, you will be in control of your life again. And being back in control, you’ll see work or training is there to support a higher purpose. And from here, you’ll have a vantage point from which you can recognise better methods, and oppotunities to find a better path to your goals. You won’t be stuck, trapped as a slave to your ideas.
All posts