The last thing I ever want is to be on autopilot professionally. The idea makes me want to hurl. It is more or less inconceivable. I’d rather struggle than be a member of the corporate walking dead. The drones obediently marching to and from the office, perfectly coiffed in their Brooks Brothers attire, day after day after day.
I know my perspective of work life and my prerequisite for passion, enjoyment and soul growth indicates that I’m in a fortunate position. There are many people globally who must do whatever job is available to them in order to survive. However, in the United States, many of us have the intelligence, education, skills, and family/community/life factors that actually give us a choice. What many people lack is the understanding and the support to make a deliberate choice for themselves. That’s changing, though. I am just one of many people working with entrepreneurs, executives, upper-level managers and other professionals to bring it about.
Increasingly, members of the leading workforce of the world are learning that we can choose to earn our living—we can choose to spend those 2,000-3,000 hours every year—doing work that we enjoy and that we know is having an undeniably positive impact on our customers, everyone in the production and delivery chain, our own lives, and that of our families. Perhaps even, society.
Those of us with skills and security have a responsibility to OURSELVES…and to others. Live a life you enjoy, month in and month out. Not just on vacations. Not just when you get a promotion or land a big account. What we really want isn’t on a billboard. What we really yearn for is a day-to-day experience that turns us on. And we can have it.
That’s where our responsibility to others comes in. Because what “they” haven’t told us, what’s been overlooked by society and religion, is that our individual inspiration and happiness hinges on recognizing our interdependence with others. Our individual inspiration and happiness hinges on our strength and courage to acknowledge our impact on the well being of others—of every human, animal, plant, river that’s effected by our consumer choices, our emotional intelligence, and our social commitment to exploring, fortifying and prioritizing true ethics (not B.S. moral lip service that’s visibly failing humanity). THAT, my friends, is what superheros are all about.
The financial success of Marvel movies are all the indicator you need that we are looking for superheros. Keep looking, too. Remind one another. And first and foremost, YOU be a superhero. Start today, and always figure out new and better ways to do it.
There is a staggering amount of opportunity in the world right now. As we are collectively seeing the unnecessary toxicity of greed (which is not, contrary to our brainwashed agreement, a human value) from financial institutions to housing to healthcare to defense and military. We are on the brink of a terrific breakthrough. It will be actual fun to shift the way lives are being lived and business is being done in the world. Every company can offer a legitimate good and service: something that people truly need. Every company can respect its employees and give them the support they deserve to live rich and healthy lives, both in the office and at home. Every company can make a profit while also operating in a way that doesn’t cause pain or suffering to the laborers nor the earth resources that are (yoo-hoo, halloo) non-negotiable for human survival.
So, who are the innovators now???
There’s a lot of good, fun work to do. Let’s get to it. ‘Cause if I’m going to work 50 hours a week or more, I damn well better love it and be very supported by it.