How to Get Everything You Deserve Out of Work

It’s spring.  It has arrived where I live, which is a minor miracle given I live in Canada and the seasons don’t strictly follow the calendar.  The windows are open to air out the house, and soon we’ll be looking at things from new perspectives…our decks and patios.  

I love new perspectives.
 
I want to share something that always brings me new perspectives, an amazing journal called Brain Pickings by Maria Popova.  I enjoy it because it makes me think in new and different ways about so many things, all connected to being a beautiful human.
 
In her last journal, Popova wrote about the relationship between freedom and fear, “… [we are] so habitually inclined toward the next moment … the parallel universe where anxiety dwells, where hope and fear for what might be eclipse what is, and where we cease to be free because we are no longer in the direct light of reality.”
 
In truth, we humans work very hard to control our future as a way of giving ourselves more freedom.  With respect to work, who hasn’t been guilty of checking their e-mail on the weekend so they can get ahead (or at least know what to expect) on Monday?  
 
Afterall, we’ve been taught that to be free we need to create options and choice for ourselves.
 
So, the weekend e-mail checking (and other coping mechanisms we use to create more “freedom”) is understandable, but at what cost?  
 
Alan Watts wrote in his book The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety “…I fall straight into contradiction when I try to act and decide in order to be happy, when I make “being pleased” my future goal. For the more my actions are directed towards future pleasures, the more I am incapable of enjoying any pleasures at all.”
 
Which shows that, unexpectedly, the moment we make a decision out of fear, we have lost our freedom. 
 
Let that sink in for a moment.
 
What is the alternative?  To give ourselves permission to enjoy the here and now, and not worry so much about the future.
 
Put your work phone in a drawer.
 
Close your laptop.
 
Turn off your notifications.
 
Go outside in the fresh spring air and just be.
 
Monday will arrive, that is a certainty: there is enough time, and you have enough talent, to deal with what comes then.  You have survived 100% of your toughest days (how's that for a fresh perspective).  
 
Frederich Nietzsche once said “No price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”  Take the arrival of spring to fully own what working gives you:  leisure time.
 
Enjoy today, it’s really all you control, and it’s everything you have right now.

Need a new perspective on having more freedom at work?  I can help.

Yes please!