Can a Job be Fun?

I love my job because it's fun, flexible and full of learning.

Mind you, over the years I’ve learned what I consider fun and interesting, may not be someone else’s cup of tea. I may prefer Earl Grey, while you prefer a fruity tea. I just call it my kind of enjoyment. So here it is.

Despite any minutiae, monotony, or administrivia, which I believe all jobs contain from time to time, or even all the time. The constant factor of engaging and meeting new people excites me. My job allows for daily interactions with individuals, and professionals from around the globe inside our company and outside. There is an element of fun in hearing a story about another person, sharing my own, and developing a common bond. The commonalities we hold as humans despite coming from different walks of life. As human beings, many of us want peace and happiness in this world. But mostly people want to share what they know, and form a common understanding. A real human bond. Despite race, religion, education or geography, there is always a commonality or two to be found. And that’s a foundation for individuals and humanity to build on. To me that is fun.

That leads to my love of learning. I do find that fun, a job that pays me to learn, and share that knowledge with those around me. It’s a continuous interaction. It’s always interesting to learn new facts, a multitude of facets, and new lessons. And with the internet it’s easy to go down that proverbial rabbit hole of knowledge. You open a web browser and get the news, all kinds of recipes, and tidbits of just about anything and everything you wanted, and didn’t want to know. Sometimes I have my all my browsers open on my computer. All that access to information at our fingertips. I just love it.

Finally, the flexibility. Working from home is a blessing as it allows for a lot more control over my day. Like turning on the dishwasher, throwing in a load of laundry, or chopping vegetables for lunch or dinner in the middle of the day. Saving time and money on a commute also allows for more time added to the day. The pandemic has curtailed my weekly visits to the office to the point of non-existence. Before I felt I had the best of both worlds being at home and being able to go into an office. The in person social interaction, grabbing an afternoon coffee, and just chatting. Despite that in-person meeting, the fact that a certain degree of flexibility remains during the day brings me a lot of joy. And the fact that I have fewer errands during the evenings, and weekends.

I look around at my friends who do things for more money, fame and even power. Many of them are we miserable in their daily lives, just waiting for the day to retire. They seem to chase one thing after the other, unable to sit still. But who am I to judge? Perhaps they do have joy, but with packed schedules, their time is not their own. I do admire them a little, I must say. But, I enjoy the freedom to set my own pace, get my work done, do various projects, and visit with the people I want too.

Mainly in life, I love injecting the fun into my daily tasks, while learning and meeting curious and intelligent people from all walks of life.

So my advice is just follow the fun, and you’ll always end up in the sun.