Is your job a labor of love, or is it just labor? As we celebrate Labor Day this weekend, it seems appropriate to reflect on our jobs and how we feel about them.
I’ve always felt blessed that, for most of my career, I’ve held jobs that I truly enjoy. Most of the time, I honestly look forward to going to work. As crazy as it sounds, I even look forward to going back to work when I’ve been on vacation long enough to feel both rested and a little bored. I realize I’m probably in the minority, and do wish I had more company in feeling that work can be a joy and doesn’t always have to be a burden.
What I find surprising is the number of people who stay in jobs that they hate for years, sometimes even decades. Studies of employee job satisfaction often yield contradictory results about how many workers actually like their jobs. But you probably don’t need a survey to identify the workers in your company who hate what they do. You can see it in their faces when they arrive in the morning and the way they count the minutes until quitting time. I hope this doesn’t describe you, but if it does, I encourage you to look deep inside yourself to figure out what needs to change for you to gain some enjoyment and satisfaction from your work.
While there’s nothing wrong with working for the paycheck, wouldn’t it be nice to enjoy yourself at the same time? Since work is likely to be a permanent fixture of your life for many years (unless you’re lucky enough to win the lottery), there’s really no need for all of those years to be ones of drudgery and unhappiness.
If you can’t make any changes in the short-term, begin thinking about what you can do over the long-term to move your career in a direction that will give you more satisfaction. While it’s true that people never lie on their deathbed wishing they had spent more time at the office, life is just too short and too precious to waste it on work that doesn’t give you a sense of pride and joy.
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