The Most Important Thing(s) in the World

I just recently read Ash Ambrose’s post on making time.

I was hoping to find tips and tricks to make more time for myself. But then I stumbled across this gem:

If you are not actively working on the most important things in the world to you, what’s the point of your work at all?

I stopped mid-post (tweeted the comment) and started to think. What are the most important things in the world to me? No faux soul-searching for me, this is easy.

My relationship with SL and our future together.
My overall happiness.
My family and friends.

things that make you happy

(source)

In full disclosure, I did just start a new job in order to get my life back to where I wanted it to be but looking back over the past 15 month, how did the job I just left effect these? Work in this case is referring to my ~~9-5~~ 7am-7pm grind.

Relationship with SL – Having to commute 3 hours a days takes time away from more fun things I could be doing with SL.
Over all happiness – My full-time gig didn’t make me terribly unhappy but it also didn’t do much to contribute to my overall happiness.
Friends and family – Long commute strikes again. And yes, I do put SL before friends and family because at the end of the day, my relationship with him does trump my others. It has to. He is my life partner.

My work was doing nothing to better my life according to what was most important to me. What is the point? I’m a smart girl with an MBA in marketing and can code. Oh, and I am a certified personal trainer. I can cobble together a few gigs and probably make just as much money and have more time to dedicate to the things in life that are MOST important to me.

So why don’t I do this? Mostly because I am scared shitless of failing. What if I quit my stable full-time job and then no will hire me to do something I love to do? What if I do get hired and something I love turns into something I don’t love?

So that is why I jumped right into another stable job that I now find real meaning in and that pays more than I was making at a job I felt slave to.

I now have more time with SL, more time for myself (and to workout on my own schedule) which make me happy and more time with me family and friends.

I considered this life change a win-win-win.