‘Your job exists to give you the life that you want’
I've never written about this in the business blog section of the blog before, but I have now.
This is something that I talk about to every business lecture that I do, to every business course I provide, and to every webinar that I’ve done.
“Your job exists to give you the life that you want”.
When I say it to people, I ask them to repeat it to themselves.
“Your job exists to give you the lives that you want”.
As you're planning for what your work will be, what your business will become, or how you hope to live, understand that your work exists to give you the life that you want
understand that your work is part of your life, and if your work is not providing you the life that you want, then change your work.
While this seems like a ridiculous Western middle-class liberal thought, it's not. I repeatedly meet people who have done this (I believe that I have too). I believe that it's possible to create a work that gives you the life outside of work that you want.
Don't misunderstand me; if you genuinely want to build a business and are willing to work 60 to 70 hours a week to achieve it, that is a wonderful thing because it doesn't feel like a chore to you. If all you're doing is building a business to make money, which ultimately makes you grossly unhappy, unhealthy, and shatters your personal relationships, it's probably worth reconsidering.
It is never worth having the more money than you will get from working ridiculous hours a week to not have any life while you do it; it's never worth it.
It's much better to slowly and carefully craft your life, to build it in a direction that allows you to have the satisfaction, the relationships, the care, the love, and the health that you strive for.
It's not possible to have everything, or to be everyone, and so just be you, just be the someone that you choose to be. It doesn't mean that you have to give up your business if you have a business or you're starting a business; it means that what you have to do is work smarter, not harder, to achieve the life you would like.