Or do you have plush towels in your linen cupboard that are only for guests, fine gilded china only for Christmas Day, or sparkling crystal wine glasses only for ‘special occasions’?
I was hanging out the washing today, and at one point, purposefully bypassing the new plastic heavy set pegs with the coloured stripe, I was tilting on one foot, arm outstretched, trying desperately to reach for an old worn wooden peg, to hang out my pyjama top. Because, it’s only a pyjama top. I could use the fancy peg for my fancy top. And it occurred to me in that moment, how odd our behaviour can be at times. Of course perhaps with the best of intentions, but ultimately to our own detriment. And, for what exactly?
Which had me reflecting on those I love who I know, as soon as that alarm goes off in the morning, struggle to swallow the lump of dread in their throats for the day that looms ahead. I’ve been there. We who stare at the ceiling, just staring into the nothing, stretching out the ‘snooze’ minutes for as long as we possibly can, with worry creased across our morning brows. Dragging aching feet across cold tiles to prepare ourselves for another day. Another day. Staring at our weathered faces in the mirror and wondering how we let it get like this? Promising ourselves, that soon, soon we would bring out the ‘big guns.’ Soon we would find another job, another path that would make this knotting of anxiety go away. But not today. Today we just need to get through today. And then tomorrow we just need to get through tomorrow. And we save our job searching for another day. A better day. When we’re in a better frame of mind. A day that, in my experience, seems never to come for some. We talk ourselves out of action, and lull ourselves back into the familiar warmth of complacency.
You know, I recall a wonderful colleague of mine from a little way back. An intelligent woman, a warm woman and someone who I took cues from and admired. And one day she told me something that really shocked me. She told me that she hated her job so much that every morning (that is every. single. morning.) on her way to work, she pulled her car over and threw up. Every morning.
Can you relate? Well, I don’t know what we are waiting for. Why we are putting ourselves through the torment of desperate unhappiness in our jobs?
Don’t get so busy making a living that you forget to make a life.
Why are we saving our CVs for a ‘special occasion’ that rarely seems to arise? We’re so busy making a living that we forget to make a life.
Have you seen the latest SEEK advertisement on TV? SEEK claim that we only spend 13 years of our actual life at work. Although that might be stretched over a 40 year career, the time compounded amounts to only 13 years.
And 13 years just happens to be unlucky for some. Don’t let that someone be you.