My career ambitions have left the building
Grind culture is bullshit. Learning how to do nothing is bliss.
Hello. I am currently sitting on a deck under full blue skies, overlooking Puget Sound and listening to the rhythmic lapping of the tide coming in. The different chirping calls of birds form a chorus around me. In the distance I hear what is an unfamiliar sound in the city: a lawn mower. To my right is a massive fig tree that in a few weeks will bear a bounty of fruit, but for now, tempts with the promise of sweet ripe figs. I am surrounded by towering Evergreens.
This is how I know I’m in Washington State. The hemlocks, the douglas firs, the red cedars, the wild blackberry bushes. Nature smells different here and the endless candles of pine, moss, and fir that I hunt for in stores is my ongoing search to find that scent captured in a jar.
Learning how to do nothing
My 17 yr old and I are staying at a cabin that has been in Mark’s extended family for generations and magic abounds—from looking up at the stars to watching the flicker of flames dance after toasting marshmallow after marshmallow on a stick. We have spotted otters and bald eagles while paddling around in the Sound underneath Mt. Rainier’s snowy peak. There are also long periods where we do absolutely nothing.
This isn’t typically how we vacation. We aren’t the kind of people who like to lay poolside at a resort for days. We prefer to jam-pack our travels with an itinerary that involves miles of walking or driving from one point of interest to the next, until we come back from the day exhausted to sleep off our sore feet and do it all over again. Even our trips to Washington, which we have made nearly every summer for the last 18 or so years to visit family, are usually full of nature hikes and road trips throughout the Pacific Northwest.
But this year feels different. Something incredible is happening. For the first time in years, I have slept seven hours for ten straight days (and counting). I have gone to bed before midnight. This is remarkable for someone who has lived on four to five hours of sleep a night for nearly two decades.
Whether it was fueled by an unfortunate case of the flu right after I landed on the West Coast or the desire to be fully present on what has become a mother/daughter trip of sorts with my 17yo before the rest of the family joins us, I have learned on this vacation to listen to my body and do nothing.
I had no intention of skipping a newsletter last Wednesday, but the writing wouldn’t come. I didn’t force it or stress as I might have done back home. Instead, I fought against my urges and closed the computer every time my mind started to wander and my fingers struggled to type out words. I stared at the water instead. I listened to the quiet, which wasn’t quiet at all once I sat still and tuned in. I’ve been tired a lot and am still moving slow; I am not used to being sick.
Being busy is a choice
I have come to admit that being busy is a choice. No, hear me out because I know that there are things, many things, that pulls us in all sorts of directions in order to make our lives function and run. But many of us choose to be busy over rest and leisure. It is a choice.
This kind of glorified grind culture where we wear our busyness like a badge of productivity may very well end with my generation because I don’t see it in Gen Z. They value rest and relaxation in a way that many of us Gen Xers don’t because we don’t respect the practice of active resting.
This has now come back to bite us because workaholism is no longer aspirational or a sign of success that it once was. Or maybe it never was, but we were too busy convincing ourselves otherwise. And that is what I mean by choice.
In this very long-tail journey of winding down a career-focused life, it’s taken far longer to disentangle from the grips of hustle mentality than I imagined. It’s a complete lifestyle rewiring. Anything that is ingrained for that long takes time to undo, especially when it’s been at the core of your entire personality. In this gradual transition to a slower pace of life, even if it means less financial gain and a different sense of self-worth, what I value keeps shifting.
Losing career ambitions
It is still shocking to admit that I no longer have any career ambitions. It didn’t happen suddenly overnight, but instead creeped up on me until I realized that I just didn’t care anymore. Yet, it still sometimes invokes panic and shame. Part of the reconciliation of a post-career life is letting go of the fear of scarcity that drives that grind and the perception of how that appears to others. It’s accepting that what I have is enough and believing that the only thing I’m giving up is the chase and not my self-worth.
Despite knowing all of this, I still needed a bout of the flu to force a pause once again; this summer was a relapse into old habits because of fear. These past few weeks away from home have been a good reminder to stop the cycle and reset.
In trying to make sense of it all I have recently learned about the five stages of retirement:
Pre-retirement
The honeymoon
Disenchantment
Reorientation
Reconciliation
I’m starting to think that pre-retirement is a slow-burning phase that has its own similar sub-stages that mirror the complete cycle. I feel that I’ve cycled through it more than once already in the last 18 months. Currently, I think I am somewhere between disenchantment and reorientation.
I’m not sure how one reaches reconciliation, the supposed last phase of retirement that is also known as the stability phase, but learning that the entire process is a well-documented rollercoaster of emotional ups and downs have been a relief. I am not swimming anchor-less as I may have thought I was. I am, in fact, exactly where I should be.
Related reading
Links & things
An influencer is running for Senate. Is she just the first of many? (Vox)
Attention, jittery investors: Stop panicking … this is what a soft landing should look like (The Conversation)
Recent stock market moves are scary, but it’s not a time to panic sell. Stay the course and don’t look at your investments. Yes, we have erased gains from the last few months, but stocks are still up for the year.
Broker – I’ve wanted to watch this film since it was released in late 2022. Finally caught it my flight and it didn’t disappoint. Directed by Kore-eda Hirokazu and set in South Korea, this film follows a mismatched group who find themselves assembled together through fate as they set out to sell a baby on the black market. The premise sounds somewhat farfetched, but what results is a story about an unexpected family unit that is touching and quite beautiful.
An Apocalyptic Meditation on Doomscrolling The next time you catch yourself doomscrolling, take it as an invitation to own your own horror. (MIT Press)
Summer Letters: A seasonal correspondence between poets Lauren Camp and Todd Davis (Orion Magazine)
Just a beautiful meditation on summer. As we wind down the season, some poetic reminders of summer to remember.
Dammit, why does everything have to have five stages?
What an interesting post. I am on native northwestern, but after being away for a great deal of time, I have had trouble reconnecting even in quiet moments.. I’m currently in the southwest exploring the possibility of new pastures my entire Substack has been devoted to figuring that out, although I don’t tell very many people :)