Today is my last day. I quit. I'm leaving. I will soon be gone. I will walk away. The door will close behind me like it has every day, day after day, never to be entered again. I will not look back. I will look forward. Forward to the change, the new, the fresh, the scary.***
I recently read a review on a book about work which explores what kind of jobs make people happy. The answer was found in the value of skilled labour/manual competence/the practice of a trade. He found plumbers, house-painters, carpenters, welders etc were personally fulfilled and, to a surprising degree, intellectually stimulated as their work requires "practical wisdom", is remunerated appropriately and genuinely benefits society producing tangible results.
Just like in Pretty Woman when old Mr Morse and Mr. Lewis declare they'll "build ships together, great big ships." Just as I should be baking beautiful cakes and contributing to the nourishment of society rather than typing letters and moving meetings, making tea and ordering pencils.
Crawford claims an idealism exists that "insistently steers young people towards the most ghostly kinds of work."
"By ghostly, Crawford means phony, ill-defined, ephemeral...pseudo-professions such as marketing or public relations, or jobs in the financial sector, human resources or knowledge management." Roy Williams, 26 Sept '09 in The Australian.
Just like in Pretty Woman when old Mr Morse and Mr. Lewis declare they'll "build ships together, great big ships." Just as I should be baking beautiful cakes and contributing to the nourishment of society rather than typing letters and moving meetings, making tea and ordering pencils.
Crawford claims an idealism exists that "insistently steers young people towards the most ghostly kinds of work."
"By ghostly, Crawford means phony, ill-defined, ephemeral...pseudo-professions such as marketing or public relations, or jobs in the financial sector, human resources or knowledge management." Roy Williams, 26 Sept '09 in The Australian.
***
Ghostly kind of work. That is what I do.
Day after day I am surrounded by ghosts.
Ghostly kind of work. That is what I do.
Day after day I am surrounded by ghosts.
12 comments:
This was a really good post and I hope that you know that. It was some major food for thought and spoke to me in more ways than one. That is such an interesting concept - the ghostly jobs. I am going to chew on that for a bit...
Loved this post. Such wonderful insight, so poetically expressed. I left the "ghost world" 2 years ago, retrained and now divide my time between working as a make up artist, running my two Etsy shops, and working as a freelance designer. I've never looked back, and even when things are a little sparse, and I'm forced to eat pasta everyday for a week, that pasta does more for my soul than media funded cocktails and canapes ever did!
To everyone considering the leap, I say "just do it" and to those who already have, "isn't it wonderful?!"
Ghostly work... wow had never thought of it like that. Congrats on leaving it all behind x
P.S. Love the cup in the first pic.
What an inspiring post about change. Congrats and best of luck!
Wow! First off,amazing images. Secondly, as a student,mother and part time worker, this post is extremely touching. As I strive to finish school and make a "real living" I read this and wonder what I am racing towards. Thank you for such insight and a post that really gets the wheels turning. I hope that your endeavors find you peace and excitement simultaneously. :)
Oh, thank you for these words this morning. I long for the day when I, too, can walk away for my next adventure!
This exact topic has been a very big discussion in our home for the past few weeks, and last night, we both decided that my McDreamy will stop working in the ghost world on October 31st and begin following his true passion on November 1st. It is a bit scary, but in life, the things that scare us most are what makes us stronger. The quote on my blog today goes hand in hand with your 'soul craft'.
Congrats to you for following your dreams...
Thank you for this post. So fitting to compliment my conversation with a good friend of mine that came by to visit me at work today. She crashed in the wave of layoffs and for me...I am still riding the wave, in this big sea of advertising. I have come to the awareness that I shall make the best of it. I shall use this experience as a tool to exist in this pool of nonsense and still keep my equanimity and deal with my insatiable need to judge it and me...in it. Kind of like a wretched yoga pose.
What a great post! I have a long-time lurker but today felt compelled to comment - this is something I have been struggling with a lot recently, and am considering fleeing the office to become a pastry chef or circus performer or toy maker. It's comforting to know that this is not something I have to question and worry about alone!
LOOOOOve this one,I printed it out and read aloud to family
brilliant post and i have been mulling over the very same thing for a year now. i am definitely going to work out how i can reduce my living costs and see if i can survive doing what i want to do and take the leap!
thanks for those inspiring words.
Great post. Great blog. When I sit in my sewing class, working toward earning skills and a degree for making things, I can't help but marvel at the beauty of all of my classmates deep into their work and I feel so lucky to be doing the same.
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