Why we don’t enjoy our work and how can we work without feeling bored?
Why do we avoid doing the work and have fun?
And even when we have fun or relax, we feel guilty for not doing the work. We feel unsatisfied and unhappy when we can’t finish our work.
After all, we have to do the work to run our business.
In this podcast, you are going to find out how can you deal with the feeling of regret of not doing the work. Let’s find out how can you enjoy doing your work?
Right click here to save this episode
What makes people happy? Is it work or free time to have fun?
You might have heard of an author called Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. He wrote a book called ‘Flow’. The spelling of the author’s name is a bit complex to share here. Just google the book called ‘The flow’.
It was at the start of the positive psychology movement.
He was looking at what makes us happy at different times of the day, based on the behaviour. He used something called” the experience sampling method”. A pager was used to communicate before mobile phones were introduced. What he did was, he had few people as participants carry a pager, and the pager would go off randomly throughout the day. Something like eight times a day.
Now, when the pager went off, participants were to stop what they were doing and fill out a questionnaire.
They have to answer two questions and the answers were surprising. Number one, what are you doing right now? And number two, what are you feeling? what he found was that when people said they were working, they listed higher self-esteem. They felt more purposeful. And they felt more confident and more directed.
But the replies from the other was even more surprising.
When people were at leisure, they felt more depressed. And they had less of a sense of purpose. It’s something that was not expected.
Then another question was also added.
They asked, “Do you wish you were doing something else right now?” When this question was asked to people who were working, They said yes. And when people were at leisure, they said, No. It’s interesting that doing something that they listed something as “Yes, I am happier when I do this. And not as happy when I do this.”
It was different.
It was a really interesting experiment. They were so conditioned to view work as something they want to avoid at all costs. Even earlier they said that they wanted not to be doing the work anymore.
But we all are doing the same.
We all are conditioned like that. There are some aspects of work. But I’m not saying you can just shift your mindset and whatever it is you’re doing now, will suddenly become enjoyable.
And there is a way to change the way you look at the work that you do.
When I read this book ‘Flow’ a few years ago, it started to change the way I approach work, I started looking for satisfaction and enjoyment in work, as opposed to trying to avoid it as much as possible. I realised that might be hard to visualise, asking you to think of work as being enjoyable, might be the same as asking you to believe that pain could be enjoyable. So how can we change the way we look at work? We hate working, but we need to work. So what can we do? Let’s find out.
It’s been said that we are naturally just like what we already are, but it’s wrong.
It’s just happening on autopilot. That means it’s just a habit. And habit can be changed and it should be changed if it’s not helping us. I want you to focus on another benefit of what you’re going to learn today.
We don’t consciously choose to be lazy.
We become lazy on autopilot mode. We really want to do the work. But we avoid doing work and we repeatedly avoid the work. And guess what, what we do repeatedly over and over again, we create that habit. We have created the habit of avoiding work. We avoid the work and keep avoiding the work without being aware of it. Now what to do to deal with the problem.
I want you to think about a couple of things.
I will ask you to think over two questions and give answers to those questions. Number one, what does it cost you day to day regarding how you’re feeling? I want you to take a moment and write down a list of things. laziness is costing you. Maybe your laziness costs you self respect, respect from others, and happiness. When we don’t finish our work it also affects our peace of mind and confidence. The pain of regret is more powerful.
What are you going to think after 5 or 10 years?
You don’t want to look back at today’s time and say I wish I could have done that. We will lose self-respect. Our laziness cost us self respect. We start hating ourselves when we realise that we’re just avoiding work. We feel good from the outside, but from the inside, we feel guilt. We see ourself as a loser. We deserve to be respected but we may not get respect from ourselves and others because we haven’t achieved anything significant.
Think about that.
We are looking for prizes, rewards, recognition and fame all These things are not possible without the required work. Whether you do the work or don’t do the work, there will always be consequences. The quality of the results or outcome depends on the quality of the work you do. Now, let’s go to the second question.
The second question is, what success is it keeping you from?
I found when I was procrastinating a lot, that I never really had any free time. my free time was spent worrying about all the things that I was not doing. When you don’t work, you are stagnant. In many cases, you are going backwards. Every minute and every day, you get an opportunity to move forward. What’s the best way to have a balance between work and leisure? Let’s find out, shall we?
If you know any artist like painters, musicians or chef, you will notice that they have a wonderful balance between work and fun.
You will even find it difficult to differentiate between their work and leisure. Everyone is an artist, including me and you. We all are here to create great things and great things are highly rewarded. We too find it rewarding after doing work with greater love and care. When we pour our heart and soul into creating things with our work, we feel happy. And that is the time when it’s difficult to see the difference between our work and fun.
The purpose of this podcast ‘Love Your Business’ is the same.
Where most business people run behind some shiny tactics and strategies that 5X or 10X their income that doesn’t work in the real world. The strategies of these new-age internet gurus keep us more involved in our work and drain our energy. We feel tired after work instead of feeling good after work. We don’t think of the life we want to live, but instead, We keep chasing the dream others are asking us to follow.
That’s not how we should be working.
In the introduction of every podcast episode, you will find a message that this ‘Love Your Business’ podcast isn’t about magical tactics on running the business that makes you bored and tired. Instead, it’s about how to Love Your business so that you can enjoy doing it and enjoy more time for yourself.
The reason is quite obvious.
Many business owners hate doing things they need to do. People lovingly start their business to live life with freedom but end up chasing their tails. This podcast shares not only knowledge but also develops skills of running a business without stress and frustration.
The core philosophy of our business is to do the work with love.
We didn’t lovingly start the business to have less freedom but to have more freedom to do the things we love to do. So that we have more time for ourselves and our family. That’s what we strictly follow. And you should do too.
So, find out what in your work can make you feel happy.
We can’t avoid doing the work but we can find the reason to love what we do. What are the parts of your business that can help you gain self-respect, respect from others and happiness? Find out what part of your work can give you peace of mind and confidence when you complete the things you started. Regret for wasting time will be painful than the pleasure of avoiding the work.
After 5 or 10 years, You don’t want to look back at today’s time and say I wish I could have done that. Do something today with fun that your future self will thank you for.
Read next: How the top performers don’t manage their time but manage their energy.
Find out, Why going slow is good even if the others around you going fast?
The One-Liner Report:
Why Customers Don’t Listen? – How to get them to listen to you with your One-Liner?
This report will show you how to explain your business in just one-line so that your customers listen and understand you as quickly as possible. Click on the button below and get a detailed ‘The One Liner Report’. It will take only 15 minutes to read.