We all want to be content. But how can we actually get there?
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My friend Scott had it made. After four years of college and three years at a prestigious law school, he landed a position at a high- powered international law firm in Chicago. I wasn't surprised. Smart, funny, talented--if anybody could write his own ticket in life, it was Scott.
I saw him again at our 10-year high school reunion. We introduced our wives, and I asked him how things were going at the big-league law firm.
"I hate it," he said. "No, seriously, I hate it. I'm gonna quit in a few months, but I haven't told anyone yet." He was visibly uncomfortable, so he changed the subject.
We ran into each other again over Christmas at a local movie theater. Because that's what guys do, I asked him the question again: "How's work?"
He smiled, relief all over his face. "I quit." "Just like that?" "Just like that." Scott had achieved the American dream--a smart kid making it to a high-status, high-paying career. Prestigious job, fascinating city, beautiful wife. But he wasn't happy. He hated the stress, hated the hours and hated the fact that, after the first few weeks, the work didn't interest him. At all.
It wasn't supposed to be this way. According to the futurists who spent the '60s and '70s telling us what life was going to be like in the year 2000, technology would have made everything much easier by now. Productivity would boom, work would get done faster, and our lives would be filled with more of the good stuff. But over the past three decades, the number of hours we work each week has steadily risen, futurists be damned. Why do we work so much? Because we can.
The futurists, in thinking that external technology would make life simpler, ignored the internal reality of humanity: We're notoriously hard to satisfy. We're always chasing fulfillment, but never seem to reach it. We work more hours to make more money. We make more money to buy more stuff. We buy more stuff to make our leisure time more enjoyable. Then we sacrifice that free time in order to work more. How much is enough?
SOURCE: Relevant Magazine
Jason Boyett is a blogger and an author, most recently of O Me of Little Faith (Zondervan). This article originally appeared in RELEVANT.
