Most people don’t hate their jobs.
Not hate in the sense that they’d like to burn the place down, sitting in the car park, laughing manically.
What they hate is talking and thinking about their jobs.
They hate Monday mornings. Endless meetings. Performance reviews. They hate it when some wanker in HR says the word “journey” and doesn’t go anywhere.
They hate all that. But not enough to do anything about it.
Instead, they spend years trapped in a strange no-man’s-land between misery and comfort. Too unhappy to enjoy it. Too comfortable to change it.
Welcome to modern work.
Word of the Week: Potential
Potential is one of the most dangerous words in the English language.
It’s probably the most positive-sounding word we can use that doesn’t involve actually accomplishing anything.
It sounds hopeful. It’s the sound of success waiting to happen. It’s that feeling of expectation when you get a penalty in the last minute of the game, just before your striker fires it over the bar and into the car park.
A frightening number of people spend their entire lives living on potential.
When I tell them about my book, they say, ‘I was thinking of writing a book.’
‘No shit,’ I reply, ‘I was thinking of robbing a bank and fleeing to Mexico. Wonder which one will happen first?’
Potential is all about ‘One day.’ The promotion they’ll go for. The business they’ll start. Eventually. When the time is right.
Potential is just procrastination waving a motivational quote.
Cliché of the Week: “Better the devil you know.”
This phrase has ruined more lives than actual devils.
People say it whenever they’re scared of change.
Bad relationship? Better the devil you know.
Terrible boss? Better the devil you know.
Soul-destroying job? Better the devil you know.
It’s a clever little phrase because it disguises fear as wisdom.
True, the unknown might be worse. But it might also be better.
The cliché quietly assumes the purpose of life is avoiding risk rather than creating something worthwhile.
It’s the surest way we know to die disappointed.
Question of the Week
Why am I stuck in an unfulfilling job?
Let’s put it through the Long Truth Method.
1. Short Truth
“My job is unfulfilling.”
Fair enough. But that’s a description, not an explanation.
Saying your job is unfulfilling is like saying your car won’t start.
You’ve identified the symptom. Not the cause.
2. Structural Truth
What exactly is wrong with it?
The pay?
The people?
The work itself?
The lack of challenge?
The lack of meaning?
The lack of progress?
Most people throw all these problems into one giant bucket labelled “my job”.
Then they wonder why they can’t fix it.
If your definition is vague, your solution will be vague.
And vague solutions produce exactly what you’d expect.
Nothing.
3. Personal Truth
Here’s the part everyone loves.
(Just kidding. Nobody likes this part.)
What are you doing to keep yourself stuck?
Not your boss.
Not the economy.
Not the government.
You.
If you take a Long Truth 1:1 session, I’m asking you to check all of these things:
Have you stopped applying?
Maybe you’ve convinced yourself you’re too old.
Maybe you’ve convinced yourself you’re too young.
Are you waiting until you feel more confident? (When do you expect that to happen?)
Maybe you’re waiting for certainty.
Maybe you’re waiting for permission.
The world is full of people waiting for a green light that never arrives.
4. Long Truth
Most people aren’t trapped by their jobs. They’re trapped by their identities.
You’ve spent ten years becoming “the accountant.” Or “the manager.” Or “the teacher.”
Or “the guy who’s worked here forever.”
Then one day you realise you’ve become loyal to a version of yourself you don’t even like.
Changing careers isn’t scary because of the work. It’s scary because it threatens the story you’ve built around who you are.
That’s why people stay. Not because they can’t leave. Because leaving would require admitting they’ve outgrown the life they carefully constructed.
5. Long Solution
Forget finding your passion. Most passion advice is rubbish.
People don’t usually discover passion. They develop it.
The better question is:
What are you curious enough about to explore further?
What are you interested enough in to spend a Saturday learning more about?
What problem are you willing to struggle with?
Then do something embarrassingly small.
One conversation. One application. One hour. One experiment.
Not because it will change your life. Because it proves you’re still capable of changing direction.
That’s the muscle most people lose first.
Final Thought
The modern workplace has mastered a remarkable trick.
It convinces intelligent adults that spending forty years doing something they don’t enjoy is perfectly normal.
People call it stability. Or security. Or being realistic.
Sometimes it’s those things.
Mostly it’s just surrender.
If you’re stuck in an unfulfilling job, the biggest question isn’t whether you should leave.
It’s whether you’ve become so accustomed to unhappiness that you’ve discarded any thought of an alternative.
And on that cheerful note - see you next time!
I’m sure we’ve all experienced this at some point in our career. It’s true that we live in fear of the unknown and stick to the ‘devil we know’.