How to Love Your Job

A middle-aged businessman sat dejectedly in
my office.

" There's something wrong with me, Doc," he
began hesitantly. "I have everything -
money, power, a great family, and all the
expensive playthings you could imagine. I
expected to enjoy myself when I got to this
point, but I don't."

"My life is a treadmill," he continued, "and
I feel stuck on it. I golf regularly, go to
the Bahamas twice a year, but nothing makes
me happy like it should. I've worked hard
all my life. I deserve some pleasure."

His eyes got misty. Embarrassed, he looked
furtively around his chair. I'll finish
telling you about his first visit in a
moment…

My patient was making the mistake we all
make when it comes to fun and recreation. We
expect fun and happiness to be
the "automatic" rewards of success. We set
goals and work hard to achieve them. In the
meantime, we accept the notion that our
happiness is just around the next bend and
will undoubtedly be reached with just a bit
more hard work.

Our all-out pursuit of happiness takes its
toll on us, especially when we notice that
the fun and happiness we're chasing is like
the proverbial brass ring - always out of
our reach. So, we compensate ourselves with
something called recreation. This is, in
fact, why the concept of recreation was
created in the first place. It's a socially
endorsed periodic activity designed
to "reward" us for the relatively joyless
enterprise we call work. A reward we crave
since our work mysteriously never delivers
our fun and happiness!

Even the term recreation itself implies
something is amiss; you don't need "re-
creating," unless some part of the
original "creation" is lost! But recreation
has, unfortunately, become
another "necessity" for busy folks who want
to stay healthy, a protection from physical
and mental burnout. All work and no play, it
turns out, makes Jack and Jill sick people
indeed.

Unfortunately, recreation too often
represents one more "chore" on an already
over-filled to-do list. What's more, the
compensation we get from it is usually not
sufficient to completely regain a healthy
balance. Rarely are vacations long enough,
and our weekends aren't free enough from
responsibilities, to overcome our reluctance
to return to the drudgery of our work.

Sadly, we realize that our efforts at
recreation are usually as fruitless as the
work from which we're escaping - neither
effort is giving us the fun and happiness we
really want. But, fortunately, there is a
way to break this cycle. It involves
correcting our mistaken idea that
success "produces" fun. The truth is just
the opposite - it is fun that produces
success. Fun is what creates your good work,
fun is not the result of it!

Guided by this truth, we can change our
focus and look for fun in everything we do,
especially our work. That is how the
gentleman sitting in my office solved his
dilemma. I taught him that fun can never
really be postponed; we either have it in
the moment or lose it forever. Once fun is
lost, no amount of effort makes up for the
deficit.

Here are the three steps my patient took
that allowed him to finally find the fun and
happiness he was always chasing:

He adjusted his attitude about fun

He learned to recognize the fundamental
difference between fun and funny. Funny is a
behavior that evokes laughter. Fun is simply
the willingness to find something positive
in every moment, regardless of the
circumstances. At times, funny can be out of
place; fun never is.

He rediscovered his aptitude for fun

We're all born with a natural affinity
towards playfulness. He learned
to "resurrect" his humor nature with certain
self-disciplines, such as smiling more
often, embracing the unexpected, and looking
for the pony in every pile of manure.

He practiced effective fun tactics

This step wasn't about telling jokes. It
involved learning such tactics as
accepting surprises as opportunities, not
setbacks, and responding to others' ideas
with "Yes, and…", instead of "Yes, but…"

By the way, during that first visit, my
patient continued, "Where the hell's your
Kleenex? You're a shrink, for God's sake. You
ought to have a damn tissue around here."

"Do you want a new one or a used one?" I
asked.

He looked at me sharply.

"The new ones cost extra," I added, keeping
a straight face.

He was momentarily confused. Then he burst
into a laugh, which lasted longer than my
silly joke deserved.

"My God, that's the first good laugh I've
had in a week," he said. "I used to laugh
all the time."

That was just the beginning of his journey,
of course, but once he began having more fun
all the time, this man's recreation became a
natural byproduct that added to his
enjoyment, rather than a desperate effort to
justify his hard work. And his hard work
morphed into the natural outgrowth of his
fun and happiness. Find your own fun and
happiness by duplicating my patient's
efforts and visit read more about The Fun Factor
if you'd like a running start!

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Some Humor for the Week

"I think we're making a step forward,
because now rock stars are dying in
treatment centers instead of hotel rooms."
George Carlin