All of us need to earn a living in one way or another to pay our bills and provide the lifestyle we choose for our self and our family. Ideally we are doing something we love, living our bliss and making money doing it or in some way working towards that. While the whole Wayne Dyer idea of doing what you love and loving what you do for a living is to say the least, ideal, it is not quite as easy as he makes it sound in his books – at least that has been my experience. But easy was never appreciated unless you are changing a tire in a snow storm or something. There is a lot to be said about getting up in the morning and looking forward to going to work. And while making a living at living your bliss is the ultimate goal, some of us are doing it and some of us don’t even know what the hell our bliss is yet – and that’s okay.
Barbequia is not about perfection; it’s about the journey there. Our occupation, profession, career, or job is just a means to pay the bills, to allow us to do the things we enjoy if we can’t do them as part of our job; to be able to enjoy our free time with the people we love, doing the things we love. I can’t begin to enumerate the people I know that define themselves, their sense of self-esteem and who they are by what they do for a living. Basing our sense of worth on what we do for a living is a very shallow view of our potential and a difficult concept to manage when an age of corporate downsizing, alternative global workforce (PC for cheap foreign labor), stock market instability or our own shallowness can change our professional life in a pen-stroke-minute. While a job can and should be a rewarding experience and we should do something we enjoy doing for a living, even if it isn’t our bliss, life is far too short to feel stuck at a job you dislike.
During my professional career, I have covered the entire spectrum from president to maintenance, from employee to owner and I have never been happier than when I realized that whatever I did to earn a living, it was merely a means to do the things I really love with the people I really love. When I chose to downsize and scale down my lifestyle and adjust my job accordingly, it only got better. Barbequia is living what you love today and your job is just a job. It has no bearing on your personal value as a member of society, to your family or anything else – it merely allows you to receive fair compensation for services rendered so you can pay your bills and have enough left to do what you love.
I look around at the people I know and watch as they go deeper and deeper into debt, work longer and longer hours to “provide for their family” and I can’t help but wonder if having the newest car, or the bigger home, the nicer clothes, can possibly compensate for children growing up spending less time than ever with their parents, being raised by the television or the video game console. It is tough to justify scarcely seeing your partner or spouse who is supposedly your best friend, the one you choose to be with for life, the person you love most in this world so you can have a nicer car, or a bigger house. It took me a couple of failed marriages to figure out that my wife would rather have me braid her a hemp bracelet and spend time sharing our life together than for me to be working into the night so I can give her a diamond tennis bracelet to compensate for my absence.
We hear so much about how both parents have to work full time these days or a family just can’t make it. Well, frankly, that’s a load of horseshit and this next story illustrates why I say that. I had a neighbor named Mike who lived next door in a small house with his wife and six kids. Mike worked for a trailer manufacturing company on the assembly line. His wife Julianne was a stay-at-home mom, so things were tight financially, but that was one happy family. Mike went on a date with his wife once a week, and while they were modest evenings out, it was quality time they spent together feeding ducks at the park while they ate their 99 cent burger and shared a 2-liter bottle of root beer. They had a “family night” every Monday evening when his family got together to play games, discuss family matters or their religion, and they always had a treat that Julianne had baked or made earlier that day. They only had 1 car, but that was fine because Mike either walked or rode his bike to work.
While the rest of us on the block were working into the evening to pay our mortgage, our cars and to get that riding lawn mower, Mike was home playing with his kids in the back yard. While the rest of us would work and work and work some more and barely squeak out a trip to Disney Land or Mexico for the summer family vacation, Mike would often be seen walking with his kids to the Tastee-freeze for 59 cent ice cream cones or strapping his old canoe to his car and heading up to the reservoir with the family for his day off. Those of us that lived on that block in Clearfield, UT would often feel sorry for Mike since he lived in the smallest house by far and obviously didn’t have the nice things we did. How foolish we were to feel anything but a desire to be just like Mike. He is still happily married to Julianne and his kids are getting college educations, married to wonderful spouses (like their parents) and they are a very close, loving family. If you ask any of Mike’s kids how they feel about their parents, they will use words like love, respect, best friend, always there for me, and the most moving is the statement from his youngest, a set of twins who very proudly say they want to be just like their daddy in every way.
Well, the rest of us got our nice cars and the riding lawn mower as well as the occasional or obligatory family vacation, but not one of us that I know of have what Mike has. It is with deep pain in my heart and regret that it took me as long as it did to figure out what Mike already knew back then – what is really important in life. I believe my ex-wife gave my riding mower to Mike when she sold the big old house after our divorce and all the time I wasted feeling sorry for Mike, I could have used far more productively for my family and myself by learning from him. Mike’s job paid the bills and allowed him to spend time with those he loves. On the other hand Mr. Director of International Marketing here has nothing to show for those days of late nights and weeks of travel but an ex-wife, resentful children and the lessons of the one that had it figured out – the quiet guy that worked on the assembly line – Mike. While the responsibility of one’s choices and their consequences cannot be placed on a job, misplacing priorities is a choice that does have consequences.