We spent the first few weeks of November in Tennessee. The trip was ambitious: we drove with four young children for 16 hours. And it was routine: we planned to lead a normal life at my in-law’s house on the edge of the Smoky Mountains. For the kids, this meant continued homeschooling; for me this meant continued remote work from my father-in-law’s office.
The trip was thus a juxtaposition. It felt a little like a vacation, especially as my in-laws have a daily happy hour of appetizers and cocktails, but it also felt pretty normal: my weekly meetings with customers still occurred. Aside from comments on my new video background on Zoom, the work was about the same. There ended up being a significant customer episode during Veterans Day, which meant that even some of my planned time off didn’t happen.
The omnipresence of remote work, its the tendency to be always-on, and the unique place knowledge work takes up in your life are themes that this missive has, in the past, complained about. And complaining probably puts it nobly: like the guys at 37signals/Basecamp, my thoughts on workaholism are best classified as those of a crank.
I’d rather be grateful.
Gratitude is less about the details and more about posture. Anyone can be “grateful” for a cold apple cider cocktail on a hot November afternoon. Being grateful for a stressful day’s work, like mine on Veteran’s Day, is far more difficult. The difference is internal: what about me causes me to complain about hard work? The reality is that my company offers a generous wage, my colleagues and customers tend towards accommodating and friendly, and we achieve decent results. The occasional hard day or skipped day off is the exception, not the rule.
From Epictetus:
Ask not that events should happen as you will, but let your will be that events should happen as they do, and you shall have peace.
Adapting this stoic wisdom to gratitude would be something like: be grateful for life as it comes, not angry that it didn’t happen differently.
And so, I’m grateful for work. Being able to do mine from anywhere, my phone included, is a blessing.
The Real Meaning of Freedom at WorkThe rise of remote work during the pandemic is just one part of a generational shift that is redefining how and why we do our jobs. |