Fear

Dear person going to a job you don’t love tomorrow,

I used to hate Sunday. On the worst weeks I could feel it starting to arrive when I laid in bed on Saturday night. On the best weeks I could fight it back until the sun went down on Sunday.

But as the light changed to dark and the day got late, I couldn’t lie to myself, Monday was coming. I would go back to a job I didn’t feel called to and collect one more photocopy of my life. That’s what it felt like. As if every Monday in Atlanta was just like the last Monday and the next Monday. There wasn’t a lot of color, just grays and blacks, in the continuous cycle of commute, work, commute.

Maybe that’s you. Maybe you know what I’m talking about. Maybe it’s your husband or your friend and you need to send this post to them immediately. Regardless, here we find ourselves on a Sunday night. (Or worse yet, a Monday morning when this post will be emailed to you if you signed up for that.)

Why will this week be different? Will this Monday be less “Monday” than the last?

The simple truth is it won’t be unless you will be first. That’s the thing about Monday. Monday only knocks you over if you don’t knock it over first.

[Tweet “Monday only knocks you over if you don’t knock it over first.”]

There is no career unicorn, trust me I have looked with great fervor. All there is are these two hands, these two feet and grit. Always grit.

Grit is one of those funny things you don’t seem to find until you’ve had enough Monday. Enough discouragement. Enough invisibility at a job that gave you a promotion in responsibility but not salary. A job that stole your weekends and measured your vacation days to the very minute.  A job that told you one day, “You should just be glad you have a job right now.” That is garbage.

But I know a secret, friend. Want to know what it is?

This world is full of great jobs.

Ignore the reports about unemployment. Statistics are a prison if you let them be. And they’re not measuring the job you’re going to create. The one that doesn’t even exist yet. The one you’re going to dig up from deep within the Internet or create with your bare hands out of seemingly thin air. Those jobs aren’t on most peoples’ radar.

They’re on mine though. And they need to be on yours too.

Is there such thing as a perfect job? No, I do not believe in that.

But there are better jobs. Fun jobs. Dare I say amazing jobs and companies that offer them.

To people like you and people like me.

Monday is coming, perhaps it is already here. But I don’t care.

Monday is just a word on a calendar. You’re the force to be reckoned with. That’s why I wrote Do Over. You’re going to work for 40 years at a job, which means you’ll face Monday more than 2,000 times. What if we could rescue it and actually look forward to it?

[Tweet “Monday is just a word on a calendar. You’re the force to be reckoned with.”]

Most people let Monday win, but not you.

You’re the one who is going to do something different.

You.

Fear no Monday.

Jon