Shove your job Japanese style

Hi there,

While doing a but of net surfing, I came across this...

"Take your job and shove it!"
In essence, that's what the younger generation in Japan is saying as they drift from company to company, in search of their version of the promised land. Aera (12/10) makes the case that in these post-bubble days, workers in their 20's and 30's place less importance on strategic career moves than they do on finding a congenial work place. It's not the salary or the work that they treasure, so much as pleasant coworkers and amicable bosses, and if they encounter difficult human relationships, instead of working it out, they just bail out.

Source: Mainichi Interactive

While this was back in the early tech bust days and things may have changed a bit since then, it shows that dissatisfaction in the workplace doesn't just happen in corporate America or the British Isles. It can happen anywhere.

Now here's an interesting thought... I don't know the precise statistics, but I remember reading or seeing something that says that people seem to be more unhappy today than they ever have been despite general standards of living being higher than any time in history.

Why? No one knows the real answer but one theory I considered was the multitude of options available now... which while seemingly making life simpler also leads to disproportionately higher expectations amongst people. We want the best life for ourselves and those dear to us. The best education, the best clothes, the best house... we all want it, whatever that means. Now, if expectations are higher, it's also more of a challenge to get there which results in a significant gap between expectations and experience. From that we get frustration, unhappiness and in extreme situations desperation.

If we take a leaf out of the Star Wars playbook and think darkside for a moment, you might think that this is a self-perpetuating, clever plan to rule the world. Huh? Maybe we're sucked in by the machine of business. We're programmed through the media and those around us about the dream, the promised land of happiness. So the cycle begins... we see and hear about the dream, so we want more, we work harder, we get more, others get more, we want even more, we work even harder!!! And who benefits from all that? Hmmm... we think we do, because perhaps for a second or a minute we can have that victory, but it doesn't end there does it? Next week, next month... something better, someone better comes along... recycle. So who's the mouse running around the wheel now? And who's the master of the cage...

Your challenge and everyone else's for that matter??? Get out of the friggin wheel and own the cage! The first step is to see the cage for what it is. Awareness and admission of where you are is the first step in any change for the better. Sounds like an AA meeting right? Well, we're most of us are addicted (to chasing the cheese) and we don't even know. That said, I'm not suggesting the cheese is not good, but there are better ways of finding it and owning it.

Up in the next episode is a man who put together a tv show and a book on human existence and its seemingly disproportionate levels of dissatisfaction. He also had an idea as to why people seem so unhappy.

Hmmm... seems like we're focusing a little too much on why and not how doesn't it? I promise we won't get bogged down in too much of the why... because for most it's not what you want to really know about is it?

As an aside, I don't really like this template - the font seems like it's for the visually impaired which is great for people who are, but for most reading this, we're sitting so close to the screen, you'd have to be almost legally blind not to be able to read this. So I'm going to switch it, when I get around-tuit :-)