How to Not Hate your Job
It is common to hear the phrase ‘Find a job you love’ alongside thousands of people saying that they hate their job or that their job is boring.
The truth is that you never have to hate your job and you never have to be bored.
I’m going to tell you my story of when I was a teenager working in a large toy retail store. I went from hating my job to being happy at work.
Being bored is a state of mind as is hating your job, it is a certain grouping of thoughts and emotions. But on to my story.
Starting from the Bottom
When I was hired I was among about 20 newcomers. The first few weeks were training in which we spent our time trying to memorize where every toy was in the 40+ aisles and picking things up off the floor.
After this I was assigned the task of cardboard for night fill. Basically for 4+ hours every shift I would wheel a big trolley bin around picking up all the empty cardboard boxes from the new stock. Then I would go outside and dispose of them into the compactor. A job at the very bottom of the job hierarchy.
At the time I was somewhat of a straight ‘A’ student doing all the advanced maths and science subjects at school. So this was job was… boring.
But even though I always worked hard I was constantly told to work faster as if I was being slow and incompetent at the job. I would arrive a few hours after everyone else started and was always the last to leave (by about an hour usually).
So not only was I bored but I was starting to resent the job as the only comments I ever heard were regarding my inability to meet managements standard.
I worked at this task for 2 years. During christmas I would work 5 days a week, 6-8 hours, finishing between 3 and 7am for a few weeks.
A Change in Task A Increase in Pain
After 2 years my tasks were split between running the bins and working new stock into the store. The new task didn’t bring me any relief. All it brought me was more pain, being told to work faster every half an hour when I was already working as efficiently as I knew. I wasn’t being picked on, it was how management was to everyone and we all hated it.
It was around a year later that I was getting real tired of feeling really bad whenever I got home from work. I decided to try and figure out a way to stop myself from worrying at work. I decided that it doesn’t matter if I get fired, I would’ve quit anyway.
Logically this made perfect sense in my brain. Theoretically I should not need to worry because if I fail or something goes wrong and I get fired then I will be free from my torture.
But reality proved different. I still got stressed out at work, was bored and always felt terrible at and after work.
The Pain Climaxes
After another year of hating my job my roles changed and I was filling a customer service role. This involved:
- Being requested for assistance by several too many customers at the same time consistently
- Being shouted at and abused by customers for things that I have no control over and are not my fault (I got yelled at many times for things such as prices going back up after a sale finished and for selling out of an item that was (and some that weren’t) on sale)
- Kicking trouble making kids (from 7 to 18yrs old) out of the store after managing to get them off the bikes and scooters
- Being reprimanded by management for not completing tasks while I was busy serving customers
Working in this hell day after day I was glad when the odd shift came around to pedal rubbish and be bored in the wee hours of the morning! Dealing with stressed out parents during christmas all the time is a harrowing task.
Transforming Myself Transformed my Job
Needless to say, I really hated my job and all the pain that it caused me.
It was around that time that my research into psychology, religion and spirituality finally paid off. I discovered that I didn’t have to be afraid, angry and or any combination thereof. I discovered the source of my unhappiness.
The source of my unhappiness was my thoughts and emotions.
Using what I had learned I worked very hard to break free of the thoughts and emotions at work. Slowly but steadily with each shift I experienced less pain.
After a few months I was amazed at the change. I could stand and be yelled at by a customer and be totally fine with it. If any emotion or thought occurred I would get rid of it.
In my job I found peace, happiness and fun. Moving around obstacles while carrying boxes became fun. I discovered that I could actually have a conversation with customers and bring smiles to them. I was more efficient in my work (although generally not enough for management) and I was happy enough to go to work.
After another year or so I quit that job in order to start my career. When I quit I did not feel any relief, in fact I knew there were some elements of the job that were heaps of fun that I probably wouldn’t find in my new career.
Truly I had gone from hating my job to being happy at my job.
Now to talk about the technique to make the change
How to Not Hate your Job
- Realise you are not your thoughts or your emotions. You are a separate entity that has the ability to watch them
- Watch your thoughts and emotions in every moment without getting involved with them
- Every time a unintended thought or emotion appears ask for it to be destroyed
That is it. It is simple on paper. To implement it requires constant effort and attention which is difficult.
In order to break free of the thoughts and emotions you cannot be identified with them. You have to be able to objectively observe them as they appear.
Asking for their destruction is not suppressing them. It is an extension of letting them go. As they arise out of the depths you see them without being attached. Consequently you are letting them go already. Then you ask for their disintegration as they go. I use this because I found that once I added this element I had much more success in breaking free.
You do not have to be religious to ask. You can ask a religious element you have faith in or you can ask a higher aspect of yourself or you can ask into the unknown. There is stuff in this world that we do not know about so asking something in the unknown should not be to difficult for people who don’t believe in religious or spiritually associated elements. It is worth the effort.
No Need to Hate Anything in your Life
This process works in all areas of life and it is most effective when you apply it across the entire breadth of your day. If you only eliminate fear at work and allow it to grow stronger at home then it will undermine your efforts.
No longer do you need to hate visiting your relatives or doing chores around the house. You can be peaceful and happy doing anything.
Now be happy.
What Now
- Leave a comment
- Subscribe to Warrior Development
- Read posts in Making Change
July 10th, 2008 at 6:01 am
Hi there,
I looked over your blog and it looks really good. Do you ever do link exchanges on your blog roll? If you do, I’d like to exchange links with you.
Let me know if you’re interested.
Thanks..
July 10th, 2008 at 7:53 am
[...] How to Not Hate your Job It is common to hear the phrase ‘Find a job you love’ alongside thousands of people saying that they hate their job or that their job is boring. … [...]
July 10th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Another great post, I think this approach can work very well. When I look at the three things listed under how to not hate your job it helps me see where I’m out now and what I need to do to improve. I think I have 1 sorted and I’m able to apply number 2 quite often but I struggle with number 3.
Thanks Jarrod - there are so many personal development websites out there, but yours really stands out from the crowd. For me at least I am often able to apply the advice. Othertimes I’ve already worked it out for myself but wish I had read the article earlier, although it’s always fun to work things out for yourself.
July 10th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
The hardest thing about point 3 is that people are very suspicious of it. As it sounds like magic of some sort, particularly to people who have had a very strong scientific upbringing (like myself). But only practice shows any evidence.
It is very difficult to stay aware of your thoughts and emotions all the time, I’ll write more about it in the future.
Thank you very much for letting me know that you find something useful here
July 10th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
You made me remember of things I have read and have been thought many years ago but slightly got forgotten because of the lack of practice.
Thanks for reminding me.
July 11th, 2008 at 12:43 am
Thanks Martin, good luck bringing them back into your practice.
July 11th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Wow…this is a great post! Most other sites are telling us to ditch the jobs that we don’t like. You’ve offered a different perspective instead. And one that would make any person a better person!
I have to admire you for this: “After a few months I was amazed at the change. I could stand and be yelled at by a customer and be totally fine with it. If any emotion or thought occurred I would get rid of it.” Well done!
Going to be stumbling on this post after writing this comment!
Evelyn
July 11th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Your points definitely cross over into all areas of life. You can stop hating things if you choose to. Or, you can choose not to and get yourself out of that situation. Either way, your happiness is in your own hands, and no one else’s.
July 11th, 2008 at 5:13 pm
@Evelyn: Thanks for the comment and the stumble. Everyone has a set of beliefs (thoughts and feelings) that detail what a job has to meet to make us happy. Yet our beliefs are generally unrealistic, and they are unnecessary for living happily.
July 11th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
@Sara: You are absolutely right, our happiness is totally in our own hands.
I would strongly recommend anyone who hates their job spend some time really looking at themselves. If you can discover and remove the internal reasons for your unhappiness you will be happier in other areas of life where similar elements apply. Then you can change jobs if you want.
July 12th, 2008 at 2:08 am
This is very well written. I think you summed it up nicely when you said that it’s easy on paper, but required constant effort to implement. I, too, remember times earlier in my life when I hated my job, or the car in front of me, or … And I really wasn’t all that happy about life either (surprise, surprise). Once I worked on changing my attitude, my whole life outlook improved so much. And this is a good reminder that we have to continue to work on it, or those negative thoughts will have a way of working there way back in.
July 12th, 2008 at 4:54 am
I enjoyed reading this because I couldn’t tell where you were going with it until well into it. Thanks I like to be surprised. Of course we don’t have to hate anything. Resistance only brings us more of what we don’t want. As a staunch supporter of self-employment I’d like to say the best route is to enjoy your work while at the same time work on your freedom.
July 12th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
@Lance: Thanks Lance, our internals are so important. Yet so many people overlook them in life.
@Tom: Nice one Tom, I’m glad you were entertained but I don’t know if I’ll keep hiding the message till the middle of the article in the future.
July 15th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
[...] presents How to Not Hate your Job posted at Warrior Development, saying, “You can be happy at any [...]
July 25th, 2008 at 8:06 am
Jarrod, you say: “If any emotion or thought occurred I would get rid of it.
In my job I found peace, happiness and fun.”
Do you not consider peace & happiness & fun to be emotions? Perhaps there is a better word to express what you mean.
July 25th, 2008 at 10:33 am
@Jonathan: Excellent question
This is very difficult to describe, but worth a shot. There is one type of emotion called happiness which is the ‘I’m going to disneyland’, ‘I won the lottery’, ‘I got an A+’. Then there is a different type of happiness.
Peace in my experience is something that is constantly present at varying strengths when we are free of any thoughts and emotions.
Happiness and fun I probably should have described as joy, but this also has its disneyland interpretation aswell. The reason I don’t call joy exactly an emotion is because it has a different quality to the other emotions.
Fear, anger, pride, infatuation, disneyland happiness all take you away from that ever-present peace. Getting you all wrapped up in the particular emotion. The joy I am trying to describe does not take you away from ever-lasting peace. It almost seems to grow out of it.
That is the main distinction. The joy I could call a higher emotion (but I don’t like the term higher with my lack of knowledge), peace seems more like a quality of existence.
That’s my attempt to describe the difference.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:30 am
Sorry for my late response. I believe I understand what you mean. In my own words, it is the difference between Happiness and Inner Peace. Some think of them as the same thing, but to me they are different.
December 1st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
[...] to hate anything (including your job!). Then you will discover that everything in life is awesome. [details] (by [...]
December 2nd, 2008 at 9:03 am
Great personal story. One of my favorites in Litemind’s project.