I think that quite a lot of us have the desire, or the inspiration to be inspirational, to be heard, to make a difference. I think we all, to some level, want to be recognised for creativity, passion, something different. Nobody wants to be in the rat race, yet here we all are, most of us working tirelessly doing jobs we’d rather not for money that is barely enough to put food on the table with. We’ve all been there, or inevitably, are doomed to go there, so it seems. Then we look up, envious of those very few people in the working world who seem to be doing what they love, what they enjoy, an awesome job. “I want to do that!” We exclaim whilst we read internet articles about people who are paid to test water slides or people who travel the world writing articles about destinations and get paid for it. We look at them with longing, and envy, coveting everything they have. It’s true, no job is perfect and the grass always seems to be greener, these jobs must have downsides, too much chlorine exposure and the shits, for a start! But the reason we look at these things so wide-eyed and hopeful is because it shows us something. It shows us that, if we really applied ourselves, if we REALLY wanted, we could get out. We could escape. We could become these people who live life, enjoy work and earn money. There are people out there, doing just that, so it must be possible!
The truth of it is, regardless of how much we want something, there are only two ways of getting these kinds of jobs. ONE: have a lot of money. For the most part you have to spend money to make money, you want to start up your own business? That costs money. You want to travel the world? Money is what you need. You get my point, nothing is free in this world not even passion. The second option is HARD GRAFT. You want to be in a position where you are your own boss, or you feel free, or you can work from home? Most of these things require you to work hard, graft away, start from the bottom and work your way to the top. Now, this option is also easier to do if you have the first option behind you too. So what we’ve established here is that, to get anywhere in life, you need to work hard and have money- exactly the reason we are all suffering through the rat race. Chances are most people in your office will go home at the end of the day and tell themselves they’ll only be there until they have enough money to move to Batu Batu and become a turtle expert. The truth of it all, though, is this: you can do what you want. Within reason.
By this, I don’t mean that you can go into the office tomorrow, tell your boss that he’s a twat, snog the hottie you’ve been secretly drooling over for years, trash your computer and tell the managers you quit. Though if you do decide to do that, please put it on YouTube. No, what I mean is, really, like- really really, the only thing that’s stopping us from doing whatever it is that we want to do, from living our lives the way we want to, whatever that may be, is ourselves. We tell ourselves exactly what I’ve just told you in the above paragraph. I can’t do that, I need money, I can’t do that, I need to work hard first to gain recognition and establish myself. Do you know why we all think this way? Because we all keep telling ourselves these things. For centuries, our parents and our parents’ parents and their parents all keeping telling themselves and each other these things- and the reason it all started, is because one day, at some weird unexplained point in history, a group of people decided that we all needed to work, and we all needed to earn and spend “money” so that we can “buy” food and a place to live. Now get ready to jump down the rabbit hole, Alice, because none of this is actually real.
Before money was invented, people worked together, usually in villages, to hunt and gather food, and then they ate it in their homes which they built from what they had around them. Same thing as what we do now, really, only much more basic, and nothing then had VALUE. Good. Why do things need value? Money is, when you get down to the basics, essentially just a bit of paper that sums up as an “IOU.” When I lend you £5, I’m not really lending you £5. I’m lending you a bit of paper that says I’m lending you £5- but what is £5? Where is this £5? Where has it come from? “it came from your purse, emily, and now it’s in my hand.” Yes smartass I can hear that look on your face. What I mean is, essentially, there is no £5. There is no spoon. If you went back to the very very first occurance of two people exchanging money, it was one person writing on a scrap of paper “Hey I owe you for helping me, here is proof.” That then means that ALL money is not even real. NOT EVEN REAL! Now if at this point you’re feeling a bit Keeanu Reeves on me, put the spoon down, this is not the matrix.
So some people a long time ago decided that things have value and what those values were. Then some other people a bit later on decided that values could change and they should change in accordance with situations A, B, C, etc. THEN another group of people, lets call them... arseholes, decided that they should earn a PROFIT from these made up ever changing values to stuff, you know... so that they can have second houses and stuff they obviously need for doing the stressful job of making up rules and values and stuff to generally oppress the people (VIVA LA REVOLUTION!) No but really though. The only reasons these arseholes remain in power making our decisions for us and deciding how much we should pay and how much everything costs and what money is even worth (nothiiiiing!) Is because we LET them.
Admittedly, there’s a small percentage of each population who have rebelled against the system and they’ve either ended up imprisoned, dead, exported or just plain tired. Not exactly a promising prospect is it. The only way rebellion would ever actually work is if everybody, simultaneously, decided that they’d had enough. Logically, using the UK as an example, the total population of the UK is an estimated 65 million people. In the houses of common, parliament, the governing body and local authorities, they in total must make up about, 30% of the population, roughly. What I’m trying to say is there are more of us then there are of them, and if everybody in the UK stood up and said, together, “Now hang on a moment here, fuck you and everything you stand for.” Good old Queenie would be forced to hang parliament (pun intended) or something similar, until we can all sit down, have a nice cup of tea and wait for all this to blow over (the British solution to most things including revolution, genocide, the holocaust and standing on Lego.) That’s not going to happen though, even if I went into the town square and started a very enthusiastic and dramatic chorus of ‘Do you hear the people sing’ from Les Mis, people would just assume it was a flash mob and carry on in their monotonous lives.
You have to, then, do it for yourself. MAKE THE CHANGE! You want to go to Bali and live with a medicine man? GO! You want to quit your job and start a business as a sock puppeteer, YOU DO THAT! It’s no good me trying to inspire you with quirky examples and terrible cliched motivational slogans though. At the end of the day, we have one life to live and we have to make it count. Stop telling yourself that you can’t quit the office and move to Mumbai, if you really want to, and you’ve considered all of the options, just do it. I promise you one thing. You’re never going to be laid on your death bed saying “I really wish I’d got that presentation on numerical statistics in relation to advertisement and PR JUST right” or “I REALLY wish I’d have not been late from lunch that one time back in June 06, then maybe my life would have been better.” Are you? Chances are you’ll be laid there saying “well, this was shit, I should be on a beach in Morocco by now.”
