Loving the Work but Leaving the System

Mark Zammit

🔥

Jan 19 • 🗨️General discussion

Today I saw these 2 quotes from Naval Ravikant and they hit me like a ton of bricks.

“If you can't see yourself working with someone for life, don't work with them for a day.”

“Who you do business with is just as important as what you choose to do.”

There are multiple reasons why I’m drifting away from my full time place of work after nearly 17 years.

It has nothing to do with the work itself (which I love). Watching my students break through their learning hurdles is what I live for.

Nor does it have anything to do with my co-workers, as I’m mostly left to my own devices when it comes to my time in class.

But it has everything to do with suffering the insecurities and short-sightedness of a micro-managing administration that never taught a single lesson.

There is also the inability to negotiate my own working conditions, as they are decided by a collective agreement. That kind of arrangement favours the least effective performers and the mediocre, but removes any incentive to those who excel.

Also, our agreement covers 5 years but has already expired for more than 3!

To top it all off, there has been record inflation in the past 3 years, amping up the dissatisfaction even further. It would have been cool to see a 60% rise in salary... but I digress.

Lessons learned:

If you’ve already proven yourself capable in an area that you love and that others are finding painful, start your own thing ASAP and keep building on it. You will outperform and outlast more than 90% of the competition.
Working with people you vibe with removes unnecessary stress. This also applies to choosing friends and who to marry.
Break the habits that no longer serve you, so you can form newer ones that will.
Live for a higher purpose than paying your bills until the day you die.

Happy Sunday and feel free to share a thought!

19 comments