Life's What You Make It ... The World's What You Make Of It
The Whys of Work vs. Weekends, "Wage Slavery" and Other Myths
[In response to a post on the subject of people who regard work as drudgery ... and who use expressions like "wage slave"...]
This is VBD ... a Very Big Deal ... as it's a manifestation of deeper philosophical issues.
Including The Primacy of Existence, The Benevolent Universe Premise, Free Will, and Sense Of Life.
The Primacy of Existence
If a child (or an adult) accepts that Reality Comes First ... that goodies, rewards, treats, and even necessities are NOT arbitrarily granted by others (e.g. parents), but are produced ... then the simple requirement to earn what he wants & needs is obvious, natural, and (if well met) a source of enormous self-esteem.
The Benevolent Universe Premise
All the World ... including the people in the World ... is indeed a stage. A background, a playground, a factory. Whatever the complexities, it's up to each of us to utilize whatever this World, and this Life's, got to offer.
And there's more on offer than one can imagine. More potential, options, opportunities, choices than one can even consider, much less capitalize on in a single lifetime.
Sense Of Life
We each have a sense of what life is, can be, and should be.
And this sense can't be fully determined by our situation & experiences, as even a child in the most difficult of circumstances can choose to see beyond what is, to what could be and should be ... and can choose to work toward greater things ...
.... while a child of the most fortunate and advantageous of backgrounds can choose to see only the worst of people, places, and things.
Life's what you make it ... within your own soul, most of all.
Free Will
The sooner we accept our relationship to the requirements of human survival and flourishing, the sooner we can embrace the fact that, whatever opportunities or obstacles we face, it's our choices that are decisive, determinative, efficacious, powerful.
And among those choices are our own approach & demeanor ... by changing our focus, we can choose complacency, resentment, boredom, sadness, bitterness ... or pride, enthusiasm, accountability, wonder, determination, gratitude.
The Difference That Makes The Difference?
Philosophy. The fundamental beliefs we hold, not just academically, but consciously, personally, psychologically, viscerally ... about what real life is, can be, and should be.
The novelist & philosopher Ayn Rand was known to ask friends, not “how are you?” but, “how’s your Universe?”1
This is a magnificent question … and a reminder that, whatever challenges & disappointments we’ve been through, whatever irrationalities we’ve had to face and deal with … and whatever our own feelings in the moment about life, work, and people … we can always choose to think twice, and to get our relationship to reality & values, right.
https://courses.aynrand.org/works/my-thirty-years-with-ayn-rand-an-intellectual-memoir/
Thank you, I love this newsletter. I've loved all I get to do...I've never felt any difference between the days I've worked or days I didn't. I never understood why people should hate Mondays and look forward to Fridays. When I hear TGIF is is as if I'm hearing a foreign language.