Beginning: Worthy Work

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“Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” ~ Theodore Roosevelt

“Is that really going to help you make enough money?” a friend recently asked me about my business, Compass Yoga. I didn’t get my yoga teacher training nor did I start my company in order to quit my job and make my entire income from it. The intention was, and continues to be, to do something that made my time worthwhile. The job I do for money is fine. I work with nice people, I have some flexibility in my schedule, it’s helping me pay down my school loans, and I have the chance to learn about new technologies and market innovations. It’s not the work of my life, but it makes my life’s work possible under my current circumstances.

My friend, Amy, recently told me about a book called Your Money Or Your Life. I haven’t read it yet but it’s on order through Amazon. Since I work in financial services and have always been fascinated by the psychology of money (mostly because I grew up with very few financial resources), I’m looking forward to exploring the framework. The premise of the book is this: where are you trying to go, how much do you need to get there, and what plan can you put in place right now with the income you have to get you to that point, whatever that point is? Its authors put forward the idea that it is okay to have a job that makes you money to pour into your passions. They give readers permission to separate their financial life and the work that they are most passionate about.

Now, if you are making money from your greatest passion, then I applaud you. (Please tell me how it’s going, too!) Your Money or Your Life, and this post, are for those of us who are grappling with having a job that makes us some good money but doesn’t necessarily light our fire the way our other interests do. I spoke a bit about this for my interview with Liz Massey on Creative Liberty. I spent the early part of my career working in theatre. By all accounts I had exactly the job I wanted. The trouble with that job was I worked so many hours, often without good pay, that is wore me down and actually made me hate the theatre. After I left my last theatre job, I didn’t go see a show for over a year. Now I love going to the theatre — I needed to make my money some place else so I could actually fall in love with my passion again.

I’m not in any way suggesting that you run out and make lots of money doing something you hate because your passions won’t pay you well. Not at all. What I am saying is that making money doing what you love can seem like nirvana from a far and be less than satisfying up close. I also believe that making money doing what we love can be an incremental process, and progress in increments is more than fine. Every journey really is made by putting one foot in front of the other, however long that journey may take.

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