The grind is a blur, isn’t it?
Monday hits like freight train. Friday can’t come fast enough. The weekends are far too short.
And so we rush through the workdays, clenching our teeth, getting our work done, and trying to make it through another week. 5/7ths of our time is spent generally doing things we’d rather not be doing. So we rush through.
When we live like this, the days become nothing more than a foggy memory, at best. At worst, they become totally forgotten.
I’ll Never Remember
That’s because there might not be anything worth remembering. After all, who wants to remember quotas, workplace drama, shady sales practices, overlords for bosses, tired mornings, worn-out Fridays, and timed breaks? (By the way, timed breaks are really unfortunate. I get 30 minutes to relax and eat? I’m being timed? Is this the Olympics or something?)
I spent my entire career in the auto industry, working for luxury car dealerships. It was 50+ hours per week of clustercraps.
Parts often didn’t arrive correctly or at all. Technicians almost never liked the jobs you gave them. Customers were rarely happy to see me. My co-workers often saw my jobs as jobs for them to steal. My money was their money, or something like that. Makes sense. Or not.
So when you’re spending most of your waking hours in an environment that is actively subtracting from your happiness, cooling your internal happiness thermostat, you tend to adapt by becoming almost robotic. You end up kind of like a zombie, shuffling from this spot to that spot, moving from one repetitive task to another. It’s kind of like the Zombie Apocalypse is happening every day.
You shut your mind off, trying to ignore the noise. You just want to make it through and collect the paycheck. And I think you become a little numb in the process, unfortunately.
Due to this, my entire career in the auto industry (which spanned something like nine years) is a very foggy memory.
There’s much of it that I don’t really remember. I can speak in generalizations about the job functions I had to perform on a regular basis, but I remember very few specific moments.
I was rushing through from Monday to Friday as fast as I could, only to then try to slow down on the weekends. And it’s those weekend breaks that I can often clearly remember.
I remember sleeping in. Meals I’d eat. Visits to the beach. Football games on Sunday, with nachos. Afternoon jogs. Staying up late. Movies. Walks downtown. Time with friends and family.
I tried to cram in all of my happiness in on the weekends, counteracting the negative effect that the job placed on my internal happiness thermostat. And I tried to take it all in. I tried to really be there in the moment. I wanted to enjoy my time in the sun.
Well, my time in the sun is almost unlimited these days.
I’ll Never Forget
Since I’m no longer rushing to get through the week, I’ve essentially turned Zombie Mode off. The Zombie Apocalypse becomes a bit more scary once you’re no longer an unwilling participant.
I don’t want to ignore anything. I don’t want to be numb to the world. I don’t want to shuffle from place to place, task to task, issue to issue. In fact, I don’t have to be at any particular place at any time; no tasks are bothering me to complete in a timely fashion; issues are pretty rare in my daily life.
And so the way I retain memories has really changed.
I feel like I’m far more involved in moments than I ever was before. And instead of trying to cram those feelings and memories into just a day or two, I’m able to spread it out over all the days.
Now, I’m not saying I can recall with photographic memory exactly what I did on August 2nd (or any other day).
But I am saying that life is far less blurry nowadays.
Without that need to just grit your teeth and bear it on a fairly regular basis, life becomes far more pleasurable and easy going.
You want to remember things. You don’t want to forget anything. And so that desire to retain memories, feelings, smells, tastes, pleasure, and pain manifests itself by way of a larger mental library of all of it. I feel like my collection of moments are greater than ever before.
And what is life if not a collection of moments? Why live a life if you can’t remember these moments?
Conclusion
I believe my brain dealt with unhappiness through forgetfulness. By forgetting that things happened, I could protect myself from harm. It’s a protection mechanism. At least that’s how it’s worked for me.
So I’ll never remember all the little things that, in aggregate, made me very unhappy. I can only speak in generalizations nowadays. I’ll never remember what it was really like to operate like a numb zombie for most of my waking hours.
However, that protection mechanism is completely off now. Financial independence has awoken something inside of me, and my memories are far more in number and far more vivid in quality these days. I’ll never forget these moments that, in aggregate, make me a happier and more well-rounded version of me, putting me in a position to strive toward my ultimate potential as a human being.
What do you think? Do you think you’ll never remember and never forget?
Thanks for reading.
Image courtesy of: mapichai at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
(Interesting story: I had to fill out a CAPTCHA in order to download the zombie picture that accompanies this article. One of the two words for the CAPTCHA was “work”.)
Probably my favorite piece so far. I was thinking about this exact thing a few days ago. Keep it up
Jason,
Thanks so much. Glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
Best regards.
Yea, I agree with Jason above. Very interesting post; thanks for sharing! Glad I logged in and saw it.
Lot to think about. 🙂
PID,
Definitely a lot to think about. And a lot to potentially remember. 🙂
Cheers!
I can relate to the blur that you are writing about. It is very disheartening when I look back and think of the time spent doing something for a living in which you don’t enjoy. I do look forward to waking up and trying to figure out how to better the situation and find the best path forward. You serve as a great reminder that it is very possible! Thanks for the great post.
Mr Defined Sight,
I know exactly how you feel. But all that saving, investing, and hard work is worth it. There is light at the end of the tunnel. 🙂
Thanks for stopping by!
Best wishes.
That blur – yes, thinking back to previous jobs, only the highlights stand out. I know that I probably disliked them all to various degrees (not the work I did or even the company I did it for, it was generally a poisonous atmosphere due to coworkers/management) but I only remember the good people, the good laughs, the good events.
To me, the early retirement is all about reducing the unpleasant fuzz and maximize the good memories. This article highlights exactly that. Thanks!
RobDiesel,
Absolutely. It’s all about minimizing unpleasantness in one’s life so as to have more time and energy for pleasantness. Addition through subtraction. 🙂
I also remember a few highlights here and there. But those highlights are few and far between. That’s because it was mostly a grind. The good thing about financial independence is that it doesn’t make you grind and grind and grind for a little bit of the good stuff.
Thanks for dropping by!
Cheers.
Absolutely spot on. I have to forget on a daily basis to numb any drama or issues at work and make it through the day. The more I forget about it the better off I am with my sanity and happiness. Ready for my grind to be over with but I also understand that it’s needed in order to be financially free one day.
Enjoyed the article!
EPerk31
EPerk31,
I totally agree with you. You have to really turn on the blinders and numb yourself. That’s often the only way to really get through it without driving yourself crazy. In that process, you really lose a piece of your life. It’s a shame.
But it is necessary in order to get through to the other side. And it makes you appreciate financial independence that much more. 🙂
Glad you enjoyed the article. Thanks for the support.
Best wishes!
Great post, Jason. I can definitely relate to this. Powerful motivation can be created by a desire to escape this kind of situation. In my own case, my motivation comes from a slightly different (but related) angle: In 2001 the economy in Portland was really bad, and my company started laying people off. I was one of the people terminated. I couldn’t find another job. At one point I was signed up with six (!) temp agencies. Nothing. The only thing that saved me was unemployment insurance, but that was so low that every week found me getting closer and closer to not paying my bills. The irony is you have all this unlimited time when you are unemployed, but if you don’t have enough income, you can’t go anywhere or do anything. I would go on long aimless walks around my neighborhood. I finally got a job about 4 months later, but it seemed much longer for that. I still remember that fear of my savings slowly running out. Since then I have been very motivated to become financially independent. I have zero desire to save for a fancy car or designer clothes; my motivation purely comes from a desire never to be at the mercy of an employer again, for my wellbeing. I am not there yet, but hope to be in time. I will always remember that helpless feeling of NEEDING someone to hire me, because I couldn’t make it on my own without an employer. In a way it’s like being held hostage. So my motivation comes from not wanting to feel like that, ever again.
Tim,
I know exactly what that feels like. To feel powerless. To be at the mercy of an employer.
It was a similar situation that led me down this path. I was let go from a dealership up in Michigan (in the Metro Detroit area) back in 2009. Having very little savings, I was in a really tough spot. I felt worthless. But I vowed to pick myself up and never feel like that again. I had this intense motivation to put myself in a position of power, of strength. So I know exactly what you mean.
Nobody wants to feel like an employer has the final say over whether or not you pay your rent or put food in your belly. Having those basic needs (the bottom of the pyramid on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs) is a powerful platform from which to build out the rest of your needs, adding to your happiness. We have that primal desire to know that we’re always going to have a roof over our heads, food in our belly, and warmth. We don’t want to die. And I think that’s one of the biggest draws to financial independence, at the instinctual/primal level.
Thanks for sharing that. I can say from firsthand experience that I feel so much better now that I’m in control. And I’m sure you’ll feel the same once you’re on the other side. 🙂
Best regards.
“Nobody wants to feel like an employer has the final say over whether or not you pay your rent or put food in your belly.”
How true that is! I’m sure it feels great to be in control of your own life. I believe a nice side benefit of being more self reliant, is we have more time and means to help others, as well. When you are scrambling all day long just to stay ahead of your bills, and sprinting from job to home and back again, it is hard to do anything but think about yourself. And you certainly don’t have as much time to be present in the lives of those you care about.
Tim,
Definitely. That’s a great point, and it’s something I’ve been talking quite a bit about. Had I never achieved financial freedom, I’m pretty confident I wouldn’t have my current interests, which includes philanthropy. I was just way too busy and stressed out. It was all I could do to get through the week and fully recharge on the weekends.
Financial freedom allows you to be you – and a better you. 🙂
Cheers!
Spot on Jason. The daily grind isn’t something that everyone can put up for 30+ years.
Tawcan,
I know it’s not something I can do. Glad to be out! 🙂
Thanks for dropping by.
Cheers.
wow…this hits too close to home 🙁
greg,
I write and share only to motivate and inspire. I hope I accomplished that. 🙂
Best regards.
I think your work environment must have been much worse than mine. I didn’t hate. I just didn’t love it and couldn’t bear spending forty years doing something banal.
FV,
It could have been worse, I’m sure. But I’m glad to have had a job I disliked so strongly. It motivated me to get out quickly. If it were slightly more agreeable, I probably would have been there until my 40s… or later. I’m glad it worked out like it did. 🙂
Cheers.
I can’t forget TOO much about work. I blog about it!
Believe it or not, I don’t think I’d want to forget all the bad parts such as the long hours and crazy customers. I mean, I experienced them, so why not have the stories to go with them? Besides, I think I have it a little better than you did when you worked, Jason. I actually love banking and finance. I just can’t stand sales and customer service, and I can’t stand having to put out fires or investigate people with them right in front of me without them realizing. But I do love the field itself and still wouldn’t ever want to forget all the stuff that got me to where I am today, even the meaningless nonsense.
Great article!
Sincerely,
ARB–Angry Retail Banker
ARB,
It definitely sounds like you enjoy more aspects of your job than I ever did. At first, I at least liked being around fancy cars. But as I fell out of love with the automobile (and in love with public transportation), it became tough to find any redeeming qualities about my occupation.
Most of my memories are more in generalizations, rather than anything particularly specific. And that provides more than enough ammo for stories (as well as appreciation for where I’m now at). Of course, there are some really unbelievable moments here and there that I’ll never forget. My last day on the job was particularly memorable. 🙂
Thanks for stopping by!
Best regards.
This is a great topic to explore. How much you feel like a zombie at work, I believe comes down to how much you dislike your work.
In a perfect world we would all contribute in ways we find fulfilling and get paid well to do so. However, in the imperfect world we live in, with increasingly bigger businesses employing most of us…work becomes more process driven, with high levels of standardization and a general lack of flexibility to exert our own creativity/personality.
That said, I think this is why we see entrepreneurship and the pursuit of early retirement on the rise. They may both may yield less consumer freedom to purchase everything and anything you want…but many are starting to realize how amazing freedom, flexibility and work can be, compared to lifelong employment.
Nicki,
Definitely agree.
In a perfect world, there might not be a need for something like financial independence. Everyone would be doing exactly what they love, and we’d all be living really happy lives. Unfortunately, something like 80% of people strongly dislike what they do or are otherwise disengaged at work. So there’s just not a lot of enjoyment going around.
But I also think that’s why you see so many changes happening. The gig economy. Frugality. Young people increasingly interested in investing. All of these products/services designed for the young investor/entrepreneur. Blogs. New businesses. Startups. Etc. People crave flexibility and tangible results. I think we all want to feel like we’re helping and positively changing the world. We want to feel in control. And we want do things on our terms. It’s this thought process that’s leading me into some exciting new projects. I want to have a tangible impact on people. And so I think 2017 is going to be really exciting. I’m ready to work more directly with people, rather than just writing all the time. Being flexible and in control is allowing me to take on some new ideas. It’s very fun.
I think we’ll see more and more people take advantage of the resources we have at our disposal. And I hope to continue being part of that change. 🙂
Best wishes.
Nice article Jason. Enjoyed the topic and reading it. I think all of us can relate to this in some capacity, some more if they feel how you did at your old job, and some less if they enjoy aspects. Glad you have found something that makes you happy and allows you enjoy your memories.
Time doesn’t bode well for remembering the miserable day to day things in your job that you are trying to block out. When I quit my job the first time (before going back), I had a laundry list of things that made me miserable on a daily basis. The negative far outweighed the positive and it was bothering me a lot. However, once I left, I was shocked at how quickly those memories vanished from my mind.
Just out of curiosity, and don’t feel like you need to answer this. How would you say you felt towards the end of your own website. If you didn’t like the daily maintenance and all the behind the scenes actions, did you feel like it was a blur and you can’t really process the memories? Or would you say your situation is closer to ARB’s where you will always remember some aspects of it. I guess you are enjoying those aspects of it now through this website.
One other thing. I see in a lot of comments you talk a lot about the beginning and how you thought you would (and did) enjoy working with luxury cars at the beginning of your job. Do you remember those first few memories better? Are you able to remember the good times you had at this job before everything became a blur and you were miserable at the workplace? I’m sure there was a period that you enjoyed the work and you weren’t instantly miserable. It may have been bad at the end, but are there some good memories that you remember from the beginning. Going back to the example of me, I’ll always remember the great times I had at the beginning of my career despite all the negative. In the second job I had, during my brief three month stint, I still have a very clear vision of the misery and the good times.
But as you said in your conclusion, “At least that’s how it’s worked for me.” Each person has a different take on this and each person has a different mind. What I remember and what my mind is capable of remembering is completely different than yours and all the other commenters here. That’s the beauty of each person being unique. So hopefully you don’t read this as one of those “You aren’t the same as me so you are wrong” comments. Rather, I was just curious about your views on the items.
-Bert
Bert,
Those are interesting questions there. Thanks for asking!
I’d say I do have clearer and better memories when I first started my job. Everything was kind of new and exciting back then. I remember going off for training, driving cool cars, and learning totally new things. I was finally making good money. And I felt like I was part of a team. I actually fondly remember that first year or so. But it deteriorated over time.
I think there’s a life cycle to most things in life. It’s something I wrote about before. We master things over time. And when we master things, whatever it is we’re doing can become sort of routine. We need challenges. But we need the right challenges. The job just became a grind for me over time. Plus, I’m getting older. Working 50-60 hours per week at a car dealership is different at 25 than it is at 35 (or 45 or 55). Everything changes. We change. Our perspectives change. Unfortunately, a lot of jobs don’t change with us. People are afraid of change, even if change is usually a good thing. This is a topic I plan on addressing soon, by the way.
As for your other question, very little about running Dividend Mantra was a blur. Nor is that the case with this site. I thoroughly enjoyed running things for years. And I obviously poured my heart and soul into the 650 or whatever articles I published there (plus the hundreds of freelance articles). I can recall off the top of my head most articles I wrote, most comments I responded to, and even how I was feeling when I was writing about certain subjects.
However, sometimes things start to scale rapidly, as was the case for me with Dividend Mantra in 2015. It went from being manageable for years to being incredibly time consuming all of the sudden. Even when things became really big, I still enjoyed many aspects of running the site. Most of all, I enjoy connecting with people. My writing is simply a tool that allows me to do that. But there’s nothing I particularly enjoy about the management of the infrastructure of a website. When the site wasn’t large, it was easy to overlook my feelings on these tasks. That’s because I loved everything else. The tasks I didn’t like allowed me to do all kinds of things I did like. When things became very big, though, it wasn’t so easy for me to overlook that any more. So I’d say the management of the site probably became a blur for a very short period of time during the summer of 2015. When I noticed that feeling sneaking up on me, I knew it was time for a change. And I’ll always make a change whenever I start to get that feeling. Of course, I look forward to change, whereas most people do not. That’s what separates me from a lot of people, in my opinion. And that fear of change is what holds a lot of people back. But to each their own.
I wouldn’t say we feel all that different about this subject. Your observation about how quickly those miserable memories faded from your mind just shows how your body goes into that protection mode I wrote about. You weren’t holding on to those memories, so they just drifted away like a snowflake in the wind. There’s nothing holding them there for you.
Thanks again for the great questions. I enjoy having this kind of dialogue. 🙂
Best regards.
Great article, Jason. Part of me that takes a contrarian stance on things started to think about the Charlie Munger analogy of having to eat your peas before getting to dessert but there is more to it than this. Too much hardship for too long turns on the defense mechanism and makes the time spent a blur. While it is a useful tool for overcoming the hardships that we all must face in life (periods of illness come to mind here for example), overdoing it is not a good thing.
I’ve been in some tough jobs. Between 2008 and 2014 I had to commute 3+ hours total between going and coming to work each day. I had a driver but I was a prisoner in that car. It was stressful and unpleasant to rush in the morning and then to try and hope that traffic was going my way. It usually wasn’t as I live in one of the most congested cities in SE Asia. All that led to making life a blur. I remember early in this job jogging laps around a small park with there being something like 5 1/3 laps to the mile. As I’d go around the park in just over a minute I’d imagine that it was one week of working that was going by and that I was trying my best to tough it out that first year. Not a very good way to spend the precious years of life.
Fortunately my job has gotten much easier with only a one mile commute each way to the office but I am still busy with lots of projects. For the most part it is generally fun but I still get overloaded and the “blur” factor comes into play. I also get that sense of blur when doing fun things, like a 3 hour bike ride in the mountains this weekend.
I like this article because it encourages mindfulness and for us to stop and look around to ensure we are in the right habit, mindsets and lifestyle design. As for the way memories are stored, I’m looking forward to experience how I may see a change in myself. It will be a new experience for me.
-Mike
Mike,
Yeah, I know how all of that feels.
I agree that hardship makes us appreciate the good things that much more. When I work hard for something, I enjoy the rewards much more than when something is just given to me. But hard work and enjoying work are not mutually exclusive concepts. I still work pretty hard these days, but my life is no longer this zombie-like existence that it was for a number of years prior.
Appreciate you stopping by. And I hope that things will only improve for you! 🙂
Cheers.
So many people are stuck in jobs they do not enjoy for various reasons. This is unfortunate circumstance of our society and corporations, who constantly give reasons to dislike job related rules that are counter happiness. People also contribute to this, just like you mentioned, and most of the changes come from the top down, as to squeeze employees. Granted times are better than they were in the 1940s with the industrial revolution, but we still have a long way to go.
RichUncle EL,
I have high hopes for the future. I’m super optimistic that things will only continue to improve for all of us. I can even foresee a day when the concept of financial independence isn’t quite as attractive. But in the present day, I expect more and more people will continue to seek out flexibility. It’s just natural, in my opinion.
Cheers!
I remember those blurry days well. I’m so thankful they are gone.
With that said, I seem almost as busy in retirement as I was at work. I still wonder how I got anything done when I had a job.
But the tasks I do now are ones I want to do — not the mind-numbing, blurry world of just getting through — and that makes all the difference.
esimoney,
Right. I’m glad you mention that. As I wrote about in an earlier comment, hard work and enjoying work aren’t mutually exclusive. This article isn’t condemning hard work – I still work really hard these days, even though I don’t have to. Rather, I’m saying that we should seek to escape work that is completely lacking enjoyment. When it’s miserable, you kind of mentally shut down, just hoping that the time will pass. And that’s no way to live a life.
Thanks so much for adding that!
Best regards.
My job is pretty harsh and has been for a while since the middle of the recession. I think it is a blur most of the time, but have been trying to combat that by establishing goals to get out. I try to go two week periods when I get paid and auto-draft half my paycheck into my brokerage account. This has understandably made my portfolio grow significantly over the last couple of years. I think I have about 120 pay periods left before I am financially free (depending on Mr. Market, and my success of course). If I don’t make it by then, I may just take some menial job or a temporary mindless low paying job I like to bridge the gap. . . On my way 🙂
Daniel,
I remember being in that same spot. I thought I could make it all the way to financial independence before I quit, but I just couldn’t make it. Once I realized that it wasn’t necessary, I left. The whole idea where one has to be 100% there before quitting their job is outdated at best and silly at worst. Fortunately, things are changing and people are seeing that much of the math is moot. Flexibility is really where it’s at.
Best of luck as you slowly make your stage exit left. 🙂
Cheers.
Great post Jason. It really shows what made you seek early “retirement” from the workforce. I know you do a lot of writing do you think over the years you may tire of writing? I used to do a lot of writing and I know I would get burned out from it.
Derrick,
Thanks so much. I’m glad you enjoyed it. 🙂
Yeah, I don’t plan to be blogging when I’m 70 years old. It’s not like I’m going to be writing about how much my dentures cost. Ha!
I’m still enjoying writing immensely, but as I wrote about back on Dividend Mantra, living multiple lifetimes and evolving as a person is a healthy thing. Most people hate change. They like security. And that’s what kind of traps them. I look forward to change.
With that said, I still plan to write and spread the message for the time being. But I will be writing a little less in the near future so as to make room/time/energy for a new project. Blogging can be a very lonely enterprise. I’m interested in connecting directly with people, in a more tangible manner. The days of me spending all of my time sharing my experiences are probably coming to an end. I want to be more involved in OTHER people’s lives, helping THEM achieve financial independence. I’ll be announcing that professional change here pretty soon.
Thanks for dropping by!
Best wishes.
I’m about to go spend 9 hours in zombie mode. Thanks for the motivation to keep grinding.
bluegrassdividends,
There is light at the end of the tunnel. 🙂
Best of luck!
Cheers.
Haha loved the side story there about working for the captcha fill-in.
I must say that I actually enjoyed or at least convinced myself that I enjoyed work and there were aspects of it that I thrived on. At the same time I also didn’t enjoy the restrictions in place i.e. getting in at 9am etc
Very thought provoking here Jase! Thanks bud
Jef,
I agree with you. I suppose there were certain elements of the job that I intermittently enjoyed. I miss the camaraderie, which is something I’ve touched on. Living this lifestyle where you’re no longer working a regular 9-5 kind of isolates you. Nothing is perfect. But the drawbacks of my old job far outnumbered the benefits, unfortunately. And nothing prevents one from continuing to work some kind of regular job once they’re financially independent. Work and financial independence aren’t mutually exclusive. 🙂
Thanks for dropping by!
Best regards.