Another day, another dollar
Posted on June 23, 2009 by Tom
Confronted with a deadline, people barge into your office asking stuff you actually don’t have the time for or the patience. You try to figure out how you’re going to balance your workrelationships with your resposibilities back home. Working overtime isn’t an option… maybe do some stuff at home… catch up…?
You never imagined it would go like this right? You read the job description, had some talks before you started working at that place. Decided it was just what you needed, a new challenge, steering your life into a new direction. But soon you find out that after 2 months about 50% of your time is spent on what you agreed on and the other 50% is ‘wasted’ on things you hoped you left behind at the previous job.
It’s a real wake-up call to realize that the perfect job doesn’t exist. I know people who’ve actually wasted months looking for the job of their life, only to find out that it doesn’t exist. But they kept looking for it, only to find out that they in fact wasted their time and effort and ended up with something they really don’t like. And just because they kept hoping for the dreamjob, they go to work disappointed and come home depressed, knowing that tomorrow will be ‘another day, another dollar.’
What does exist is a job that comes close, really close. We can all shrug our shoulders, saying to ourselves that it’s ‘just a job, a way to get cash, to pay the bills’. But is that how you look at something you probably have to do for over 40 years? ‘Another day, another dollar?’ That’s a pretty depressing future for someone who just wants to pay the bills. Is it really that hard to find something you really like in a job? To focus on what matters to you, not the company? To find value in what you are doing? Because as easy as you can find that, you can find a way to forget you’re working ‘another day.’
