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Many times, in these pages over the last 7-8 years I’ve written this phrase below. 

“Your work exists to give you the life that you want”. 

Two stories recently that are entirely at odds with this philosophy which might give you the chance to stop and think today about how you might change things to make it better. They certainly made me stop and think to try and get things better again. 

Story one 

I had the opportunity to speak to someone who works for a large multi-national dental company. They were recently offered an opportunity to “step up”, way up the chain in that company to a multi-national level. 

In discussions with the person who was offering them the position it was made entirely clear that the position comes with, what they described as “collateral damage” it was explained again very clearly to them that everyone who sat on that part of the company’s organisational body was on their second wife as a result of the position that they too.

“Your work exists to give you the life you want” 

Story Two 

In another conversation with someone outside of dentistry who has recently just been able to accept a board position with another very large footsie company, they told me that they had been able to replace someone on the board who had been off work for 2 years with mental health issues. 

It might be wrong to think that chasing all the way up to the board will be the cure for your stress, or your life problems or your difficulties. 

“Your work exists to give you the life you want” 

Going harder with the shiny bright objects, when they’re not making you feel good is unlikely to make you feel better, but very likely to make you feel broken. I need to challenge this theory regularly to make sure that my work is giving me exactly the life that I want. 

I’d rather not trade my health and I would certainly rather not trade my wife for a step up the ladder to more glory and more money. 

Blog Post Number- 1972