I was listening to the radio yesterday and the radio personality said something so interesting. The conversation was really about this girl and his toxic boyfriend. The boyfriend, apparently, is an alcoholic who spends most of his weekends with his friends at clubs and pubs. During the week, the boyfriend is always working. This segment of the show is really not for entertainment. It is about serious engagements with the audience who are facing serious problems. In their advice, the one radio personality said that the man uses the weekend to recharge. He does this because the week belongs to his work. This is what I found interesting.
Yes, the radio personality was explaining to the lady how the man does not prioritise her. The radio personality, obviously, was showing the lady "the light" about her boyfriend so to say. But the statement; ‘the week belongs to his work’ really struck a chord. The statement implies that 5 days a week, your life belongs to a corporation. 5 days a week, your sole existence is to make someone afford to go on vacation on the 24th of a month- even if it is Tuesday in January. There are people who live by the motto that they work hard, to play hard. Loosely translated, they are saying that they work 5 days for 40 hours in order to play for 2 days for roughly 32 hours (minus the 8-hour sleep on Friday and Saturday). Another person might spend 5 days working 40 hours. On Saturday, spend the day engaging in their hobby, and on Sunday, spend the mornings at church and with the family in the afternoon. The fact remains that somehow, it has become a norm for a person to spend 260 days out of 365 days of a year working for a corporation that recognises you by a number.
This year, for me, I believe that the Lord was reminding me of this fact. This year was a year with its ups and downs. The ups were in the first semester when I was earning two incomes. I was living sof'. So I thought I was. It is interesting as I think about it how I was giving in to the system. The system was treating me nicely. The system was feeding me junk food daily. I regained the weight I had lost in two years in about 2 months. I was very comfortable. It is this comfort that makes employment such a “dream”. Fundamentally, one only has to give employers the bare minimum of their time. That’s it. However, what happens is that by even giving them the bare minimum, you are still giving them your time. Time is the currency we use to pay for our existence. Those 6 months is time I will never get back. The comfort (not even luxury) that came at the expense of my time was not worth it. Thinking about it, the fact remains there are people earning 100x more than the income I was earning in those 6 months. And they live in luxury that most don’t even more exist.
Then, at the end of June, one employer ended my contract. They did not tell me. It is when I was unable to access the employee portal on their website that I realized that something was amiss. I called them to ask them what could be the problem. My supervisor asked me for my employee number to find out what was going on. I won’t lie, that hurt my feelings. This place I had worked for some time. Even though I had to just give the bare minimum, my honour does not allow me to. I always go the extra mile. I give them more than my time. And yet, they do not know me. They do not know my name. They knew me by a number.
It made me remember this one incident that once happened at that place.
We were called to work on a Saturday. There was a backlog and there was a lot of work that had to be done. On this day, one of the employees that called to work on that Saturday passed away that very same day. Apparently, she was quickly going to her house to get something. Unfortunately, on her drive to her house, she had an accident that resulted in her death. This is a tragedy. Someone’s sister and maybe wife (I didn’t know her personally) had passed on. And she passed on a day that she did not have to be at work for. Only an announcement was made about her passing and business continued as normal. What was important to the corporation was the bottom line, not her life. Her life that she sacrificed working there.
And that is the truth of employment. The managers and supervisors might be great individuals but the corporation does not care about that. They care about the bottom line. To the great scheme of things, you as an individual are replaceable in a workplace. There was a lecturer that once taught me that. My naïve thinking reasoned that of course, he can say that. He is old and has lived a great deal of life. My thinking was that I am young and I have to work for my success. Indeed, I still believe this. That I am young and must work for my success. But I no longer believe in working hard for a corporation for your success.
Truth of the matter is, I have always had this belief. Primarily, it is the reason why I pursued a B. Com degree so that I can be an entrepreneur. There is a saying that states that the employee works 40 years just to enjoy 20 years of their life. The entrepreneur works 20 years to enjoy 40 years of their life. When one reads and studies most of the rich millennials of today, it is even more mind-blowing to realise that some of these people worked hard for a year or two building a YouTube channel or something of this nature, and already, they living far better financially than those in traditional jobs. In the book, The Fastline Millionaire, the author illustrates how the entrepreneur's earnings are exponential while that of the employee is linear. An economist once explained how incomes have not really changed over the past decades. They have just been adjusted to the current inflation of the times. And what is sad, some jobs will give their employees an increase of 1% or 2% while inflation is currently near 4%. Therefore, their “increase” is in reality a decrease.
This painful reminder brought me back to Earth. Made me remember that employment is a trap. There are those who love their jobs and their work environments are conducive for their personal growth. These workplaces do exist. But, they are rare. Like medicine and law, entrepreneurship is not for everyone. I find myself waking up and breaking free from the rooster coup like in The White Tiger. The master in this case is the me that got comfortable. The me who decided to delay my dreams and goals for a career. A career that hinges on furthering my qualifications and on hopes and prayers that an opportunity will open in the marketplace. Forgetting the fact that entrepreneurs create their own opportunities. This is what makes them successful in the first place. This is what makes the entrepreneur free from the system.
This year was a year of reckoning. A year I needed to strengthen my pursuit for success. In my hero’s journey, this year was the 2nd act where I went to face the beast. I thank the Lord I came out alive.
Comments