I’m always excited when somebody puts in their two-weeks-notice. Especially, when they do not even have a job lined up. It does not matter if they are going to travel, go back to school, change careers, or just take a break…that person has a bright future ahead.
On the contrary, my father worked 80-hour weeks over the course of a twenty-year construction career (to support the family). He was beginning to shop for an RV he could travel with and only had a few years left until retirement; however, he got cancer and died early. I rarely saw the guy for the last ten years of his life because of his work schedule. I would love to have shared what were my teen years with him…but this was the American Dream…you work hard, and…then what?
I understand that “Pura Vida” is situational, generational, cultural and individual. I have a family member that swears, “All I want to do is check in, check out, and not even think about work the rest of the time.“ I am envious, in ways, because I find that it is difficult to simply checkout, especially the older I get. But, for me, there is always so much I want to do, and I could die tomorrow, so everything I do must count.
The new generation will no longer depend on working 25 years within a specialty field, as trades are evolving ever so quickly, and the craftsman is dwindling. The technology era will allow people to work from home, spend time with their families, walk their dogs, and take extended vacations. There is no such thing as a retirement because you love what you do, and you do this until you die.
The problem is that it is often difficult to find something that you love to do while making money doing it. Unappealing jobs are fine in the short term, but the fact that a job that nobody wants exists in the first place, speaks of a larger systemic problem. For example, if handling garbage is a job no one wants, then maybe we should not be creating garbage to begin with. Our society is completely disconnected from that which they buy, use, throw away, and this is connected to where, how and why you work in the first place.
I’ve been in the workforce for twenty years now, changed careers at least three times, and have no regrets, as I would not appreciate that which I do now without having experienced things as I have (a "Candide" mindset). I put a tremendous amount of time into everything I do, but once I hit a certain level of proficiency, I seem to move on to something else. Now at age 38, I have been a musician, a biologist, a chemist, a property manager, a designer and a biomimic. At age 58, I look forward to have been an architect, a city planner, a movie-script writer, director, actor and lastly…a father.
Related Songs:
Related Songs:
The Features-The Temporary Blues
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