Work and Death
I always hear “No one wishes they had worked more when they are on their deathbed.”
Then they have the wrong job.
I have worked helping other since 1988. I got a job at a group home for teens in the juvenile justice system. It was frustrating, hard, important work, and even when it was a terrible job, I knew I was helping people. For YEARS after a client would leave, they would call, speak to me and let me know how I helped them.
I left that field in 2007 and then started working with developmentally disabled adults in 2010, which honestly doesn’t seem that long ago at this point. When I come in to work, they are happy to see me (most days) and even making dinner and giving out pills, I am working to make their lives better.
At both of these jobs, I worked more than I should. I have usually had to have a bland full-time office job, because these jobs don’t pay a decent wage.
I also write and podcast. I am just starting to see some money from that, and I see these as my “job.” I don’t regret a single moment I have spent doing either of those things either, as it means I am creating or chatting with friends and creative people about things we love.
Hell, there have been people in my life who, when I look back on it, I should have blown then off and taken that extra shift at the group home, and I regret ever having wasted time with them.
If you don’t wish you spent more time at your job…maybe you have the wrong job. Maybe you need to follow your bliss, find a job you WANT to do. If you are doing a job you love, it’s like you never work a day in your life.
Is it easy? Nope. Can everyone do it? Sadly, no. But I truly believe that if you have a job you love, you won’t mind working at it. I feel it is important for me to help people who I can help…so even though I get owly about being away from home, get exhausted by working with people or just complain about working too much…I know what I do matters.
