Career News 24/7: The Cynical Girl: Your Job Is Killing You

Thursday, June 30, 2011

The Cynical Girl: Your Job Is Killing You

Posted: 29 Jun 2011 03:45 AM PDT

First we heard that sitting all day will kill you.

Now comes word that people are taking too many sleeping aids and anti-anxiety medications (probably due to the impact of commuting too much and sitting too long at work) and waking up with a sleeping pill hangover.

That’s great. Work is killing you and you are medicating with Xanax to make it more tolerable — and risking injury to yourself and others when you get in the car to drive your long-ass-shitty commute.

Good job.

Here’s another idea.

Keep expenses low.
Don’t worry about keeping up with the Joneses.
Tell your kids no.
Bank some cash.
Live the American dream and tell your boss to go fuck himself.

Now listen, I would never advise you to quit a job without having another job lined up. And really, your boss isn’t your problem. It’s you. Because of poor spending habits or bad choices in life, you have to work at your dead-end job. Then you eat yourself into a food coma, buy Coach purses, and take xanax to numb the pain.

And I’m saying — the pain doesn’t go away. I know. I am you. Four years later.

The only way to take control of your life — and your mind, your body, and your spirit — is to just. say. no. to the short-term desire that adds to your long-term suffering. The clothes. The shoes. The house you can’t afford. The remodeling project you don’t need. The car that is really nice but you can’t justify.

You might suffer when you say no to the consumer-driven-middle-class-lifestyle. It sucks to drive a 2000 Subaru Forester with 116,000 miles when your neighbor owns two Corvettes and a Land Rover and your friends are vacationing in Turtle Inn.

But you know what? Those asshats are three payments behind on their house.

And the suffering you endure by opting out of the consumer-driven economy is noble. Your kids will live. And you will — at some point — be in charge of your own destiny.

And any money that comes with your new freedom is a blessing.

Trust me.