#MondayMotivation – Change The Way You See Work
The reason you hate Mondays, apart from the traffic, the early rising and the hustle, might go beyond the type of job you do. Sure, some jobs are crap, and sure not everyone can do a job they love; however, most jobs are decent enough, if you learn to see them the right way. Unfortunately, most of us grew with the wrong impression of work.
Most of us were raised on mantras like: “Once you have a job your money problems will disappear,” “you’re supposed to hate work,” “don’t stress yourself too much, just show face and collect your money month end” and so on. On entering the labor market, we find that most of these things aren’t true: money problems still abound, doing the barest minimum at work is a bad strategy, and because some people actually like work, they rise faster than you in the work place. So, you’re left feeling lost and dreading work.
However, hope is not lost, there are things you can do to re-orient your perception of work and make it more engaging. Here are a few
- Accept that your idea of work is wrong:
When I first started work at TW, I was under the impression that I was solely here to write, I didn’t have to worry about generating topics and ideas. A few months down the line, I was frustrated, because I found myself having to think more than I was expecting. The only way to push through my slump, was to accept my wrong ideas, and accept the extra responsibility, thrust on me. That didn’t make the job easier, but it increased my willingness to work hard.
- Change your workflow:
Sometimes the manner in which you go about doing your job can make it lifeless. For example, there’s an aspect of journalism called transcribing; it involves listening to interviews, and writing down the conversation word for word. It can be a very mind-numbing task, especially when the interviews are long, however, I learnt to make it engaging, by including challenges like trying to type at the same speed as the speaker, listening to the audio and memorizing what was said, and so on. You can try to include mini challenges in your workflow to make it more engaging and put you in a state of flow.
- Do online research about your job:
Apart from learning new techniques, this can also help you see your job from other people’s perspectives, and give you a new appreciation for it.
- Make friends with your co-workers:
Workplace rapport, and sharing your burdens with co-workers who genuinely care about you and your career future can make work very enjoyable, and is also a very good opportunity to get other perspectives on work.
- Have a founder’s mindset:
Step out of your head, and your issues, take time to think about your organization, its mission and its vision, and ask yourself, if I was in a position to positively influence the company, what would I do? When you have an answer, look for the simplest way to achieve it, and do that.
