The Work of Life

(gentle music) Headspace Studio. (relaxing music) Hi, it's Andy here, and welcome to Radio Headspace and to Friday morning. If you are in work at the moment. I don't know how you view your work, whether your work is something that's a passion, something you feel really invested in, or whether it's something you simply do to earn a living, to pay your rent, to buy food, to do the other things in life that you like to do. Just recently, I was chatting with a friend of mine and this is a conversation, by the way, that has gone on for over 20 years. Just to be clear, you know those conversations you have with friends where it sort of was a reoccurring theme. And for this particular friend, he's always been a little uncertain, I would say, in his work. But you know, he likes his work. At the same time, the work that he does, he doesn't necessarily feel passionate about, and so there's always been this tension in his life. On the one hand, there is this sort of career path, a company that looks after him well, that provides healthcare for his family, and sort of the responsibilities that have grown over the course of that career. At the same time, it's not something he feels massively passionate about. It's not something that gives him a huge sense of purpose. And so there's always sort this tension. So whenever we sort of catch up, it's like, "Yeah, I'm thinking of maybe changing jobs," but you know, we're 20 years down the line now. It may happen, it may not. And I think that very often in life, we don't have the luxury of choice. We find ourselves in a situation where the work we have is the work we have and there's not necessarily the flexibility or option to change that. And in those situations, then we have to work a little harder with the mind in finding a sense of purpose and fulfillment within that thing itself. And we can do that simply by looking at it as another opportunity to train the mind. But sometimes there is the opportunity, and it reminded me, I was thinking back to a time when I used to see people one to one in a clinic in London. And there was one particular company who would send people who were particularly stressed along to the clinic. And after a little while, a number of these people, through the process of meditation in seeing their mind a little more clearly, came to the conclusion that maybe working in the financial industry was not the right thing for them. Yes, they were earning an amazing living and everything else, but they actually weren't living a life that made them happy. They were essentially putting their life on hold, waiting for a life to begin further down the line. We noticed over time how several of them, you know, as...