60,000 Hours

Yesterday I had the displeasure of tubing down a river that brings new meaning to the term “low”. While I still enjoyed myself watching drunken individuals try to salvage what was left of their punctured Shamoo raft, getting down the river was another story.

The water was lower than a pair of Dickies® in a DMX video. The modifying of our own punctured rafts would have made MacGyver proud. (cue the cheesy 80’s sitcom music) Our rafts had more holes than a victim in the Valentines Day Massacre, and yet we made the 4 and half hour journey down the mighty Chipola River relatively unscathed.

While the trip itself wasn’t all that relaxing, the company of my trip mates made the experience very enjoyable. While floating I began to think. From now on I will refuse to take trips, work, or do anything with people who make me unhappy. Work being the most important.

When you think about it during a 30 year career you will spend over 60,000 hours with these people. It feels like I have already spent 60,000 hours with Tom, the bulk of those being hours on the water. Why would anyone spend this amount of time with people that make them upset? I see and hear all the time how people hate their job and the people they work with. It’s this simple.

QUIT!

If you cannot find a job you like while still working for your hated employer, you simply are not trying hard enough. No amount of money is worth your displeasure. Cheesy, yes. Cliché, absolutely. But I think it is a sure thing and I am betting 60,000 hours of my life on it.