Work-Life Innovation |

“Hey Steve, want to go for a drink?” “Uh, no thanks. I’m tired and I have some work to do anyway. Sorry!”

“Hey, we are having a get together next week, you should come!” “Oh, sorry, I can’t, I’m er, …busy that day.” “But I haven’t told you which day its happening!”  “Well, I mean I’m busy all week, I don’t think I could make it, I’m really sorry”

“Steve, we are going to London on Saturday for a day out. You should come”
“Ahh, I think there’s something I have to do Saturday, I just can’t remember what it is right now. Can I let you know later in the week? Cheers”

Ever found yourself saying any of the above? Of course you have, everyone gets invited to things they don’t want to or can’t attend for one reason or another. What’s more troubling however are those times when you find yourself taking a rain check when you have no real good reason to.

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We all have moments when we get inspired. Moments when we feel we can turn things around; really makes a change in our lives. In those moments we discover new goals that inspire and motivate us. We start planning how we can satisfy those goals and our future seems deliciously ripe with promise. Unfortunately, over time we tend to drift away from those goals. Something happens so that they just don’t seem to be as compelling anymore. They lose their shine and slowly, day-by-day we get pulled back to our everyday life and before we know it, the goals have died and we are back to the status quo. Why is this the case?

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While its great and all to read stuff about re-designing your life, taking mini-retirements, automating your income and sailing around the world with your kids in tow. A lot of us feel a million miles away from ever being able to effect such drastic lifehacks in our own lives. The good news is that to begin changing things doesn’t have to be so dramatic. There’s a ton of small, mini-lifehacks each of us can do that will start to mix things up for us right now!

By examining the small things we could change we learn a few things. We learn that we can change and that we are not destined to keep living out the same kind of days we have always done, we also learn what making a conscious change feels like (even if only on the small scale); what it feels like to do something different on purpose, rather than doing something because its a habit and we’ve always done it. The risk is of course, you might learn to like how that feels, and who knows where that might end up…

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I sense a shifting in the force! Something is rotten is the state of productivity, and efficiency don’t live here…anymore.

Yep, the game is up. We no longer want (or need) to work 70 hour weeks, spend 15 years negotiating a complex corporate hierarchy and wait 40 years to experience the joys(?) of retirement. We want our lives back, and we want them back now.

There’s an old story about a corporate executive on holiday on a stunning island off Mexico who meets a fisherman. The exec says to the fisherman, “You have a good little business here, you should expand”. “Why should I do that?” says the fisherman. “So, you can earn more money and buy more boats. That, way you would be able to catch more fish.”. “Why would I want to do that?” replies the fisherman. “Well, so you could sell them and earn more money, expand your business even further, maybe even buy up some of the other fishing businesses here and earn even more money. Then, eventually you could sell it all, retire and go live on some beautiful island somewhere!”. “Hmm” says the fisherman, scratching his chin. “you mean like this one?”. “Oh…” says the exec.

Is the fisherman a slacker? Or has he got it right. What are we really working for anyway? Is it really worth the candle to defer your life to some uncertain future in which your too old to do the things you’d love to do now? Read the rest of this entry »

Ever thought you’d like to be doing something different? Ever dreamed about that high paid job with all the prestige, with the nice car and the big house? Ever contemplated going on a river boat ride down the Zambezi, or a hike through the Andean mountains? Ever wondered what it would feel like to swim with dolphins off the Florida Keys? Ever [insert personal dream here]? Are you doing anything about it? No? Then I suggest that what you’re doing instead is what you really want to do.

There’s a phrase that goes: you are what you do every day. What I am suggesting here is what you want to do is what you do every day. Sounds crazy I know but hear me out. Let’s be honest, for the most part we have all chosen to be where we are in our work and lives. Nobody held a gun to our heads, and even if they had, we could still have chosen the bullet! But no, we are where we are because of the choices we have made. If we are unhappy with our position in life no one is to blame but ourselves. What we do every day we have in a very real sense chosen to do. Even if that choice was the lesser of two evils, we have still freely chosen it. Luckily though, we are free to choose again.

You stack shelves for living or you clean the sewers or you’re doing a PhD or you work for a large corporation. You chose that, but you are free to choose something else at any time. If you do decide to change your situation then all you need is time and planning to make it happen. If you don’t do the planning, then ultimately you don’t really want it. And this brings us to the crucial point: what most of us don’t accept is that planning is part of the experience of what we want. Read the rest of this entry »