Interesting Shares

tl;dw: Autonomy, mastery and purpose is essential to happiness. Had all three, in spades, at a previous job. Left for double pay and benefits, total misery after losing them.

First time I watched, "Holy shit! He's about to talk about Linux!", and he did. "Hey! That's how Wikipedia works!", and it was.

I think on this every time I see comments about how someone isn't paid enough to give a shit, work harder. I was making $82K at my last job, miserable and struggled to understand what my damned problem was. Never knew employers existed that treated their people so well. Wife kept telling me I should be thankful, and I was! Yet I was deeply unhappy.

Now I'm driving a forklift and slinging mulch, satisfied as a pig in shit! Weird? I get it after internalizing this video.

• Autonomy: If I see something that needs done, I jump on it. Don't need to ask the boss or get the team's consensus, I just fucking do it. I can look back and say, "I did that!" Nobody comes along and stops me, "Yeah, we don't really have to do that." Nope, I wanted to do that, proud of how it turned out.

• Mastery: Sounds funny, but yes, I could spend a few years mastering all the fine details of this job. If I have nothing on my plate, I'm free to wander off and find someone that could use the help, learning more as I go. Getting better every day, feels good.

• Purpose: Harder to define, but for me my purpose is to "move up". That means gaining the respect of my coworkers, maxing every raise, getting better shifts, getting promoted and generally doing what I want instead of being told. Already my managers trust me, not looking for work to assign, instead trusting me to find what needs done. Every manager I've met, bar none, started out on the bottom and worked their way up. The GM and one of the assistant managers were old IT guys that gave it up to throw rocks and guide people around lumber. One coworker told me I was one of two of the new hires he actually likes, rest are dipshits. Feels good.

Anyway, if you're unhappy with your job, or your personal life, give this video a shot. It's certainly not a "how to be happy" talk, but it shows much about what motivates us.

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