Life Without Work
Over the last two weeks, I’ve written about, the meaning of life and Happiness. This has led me to thinking about work. I think most people place to much emphasis on Work. Many people unintentionally place it ahead of things I believe are more important, such as family, health, and happiness. Today I would like to explore the question:
What would you do if you didn’t have to work?
For myself the answer right now is, I don’t know. I don’t have to know. I trust myself. I trust that I would figure it out. That I would find ways to fill my days that give me meaning and purpose.
It seems a pretty naive idea at first (simply not working), but it makes all the sense in the world to me. I would take each day as it comes. In general I would not have a plan on any given week or day. I would not care what day it is, as each day would be the same (this a good thing).
I would have Time. Time to smell the roses. Time to take care of myself. Time to take care of my family and any of the things that pop up on a given day without being in a hurry. I hate being in a hurry.
I would wake up in the morning and have time to meditate, exercise, and stretch. Maybe go for a walk if I’m feeling crazy. If I finished my hypothetical morning routine and the kitchen faucet was leaking, I’d fix it. Maybe after taking my kids to school.
Would not working be a good thing?
One of my dreams is to achieve financial freedom and have the option to not have to work. I don’t think this is a unique dream. Some might say it’s naive (to think that not-working would be good). It seems pretty conventional wisdom that one of the main points of life is to find good dignified work that provides one with purpose and meaning. The part that we don’t usually say out loud is that we work a minimum of forty hours a week until we’re sixty-five (if we’re lucky and have saved enough), and then we die, having given our lives to an entity that doesn’t care about us or our happiness: The Corporation. So my dream is to find a way to work for myself, or to accumulate enough capital that I don’t need to work if I don’t want to. It’s a very difficult dream to achieve. It’s very open ended, but I think that not working, or working for myself would be my ideal way of living. I know I’m not alone in thinking this, but I find that most people do not take this dream seriously, whereas I do.
Might you struggle with self-worth?
We all need external validation of one form or another. Many of us get this from the work we do.
I think that is at the root of why “work” is so important in our culture. We’re taught that work is the only way we can derive self worth. I’m not sure who needs to hear this, but you are more than your work. There are an infinite number of other ways to find self-worth.
Thank you so much for reading!
Enjoy the rest of your day!
-Sam
I have never identified with employment work or seeing that as giving life meaning.
It's funny, last night I dreamt that I had a conversation with someone and I was saying "the biggest problem of our society is the discrepancy between what we say our ideals are and what everyone does in real life. Nobody wants to accept real life". Meaning that there are so many people trying to avoid employment-work one way ore another but still we say it's the ideal...
I know exactly what I would do, if didn't have to work, because I tried it.
I do roughly the same stuff, just less organised. And I do a lot of work for friends and acquaintances... And I work at building our house ourselves together with my husband instead of paying for things. This is a general rule. We do stuff mainly ourselves instead of paying for it to get done.
Lol, yeah, I think we've all felt this way. I used to think that if I didn't need to work I could write more. But I'm not sure that is the case. You'll always find an excuse to not write. Resistance is relentless.
If I had to write as a job then I'd be doing it for the money, which not what we want either.
But if I was rich enough to write without worrying about money then what would I write?
I'd just be writing the same stuff I do now.