It's funny how quickly we forget the Rat Race. When we are in it, we no longer see it because it permeates all the layers of our being. We get up, we work, we consume and we start again. It is everywhere, around us and deep within us. It is our very essence. It is only during brief moments of awakening that we manage to grasp the vicious side of this race we are leading.
When we finally manage to get out of it, after years of struggle, we also quickly forget about it. We change paradigms. There is a before and an after. Our life is completely changed. The frantic race we were leading seems very childish, not to say stupid. It is only when we are confronted with situations or people who remind us of our previous existence that we become aware of it.
This morning for example, I was woken up at 7:00 am by a neighbor who was clearing snow off his car. It made me smile inwardly as I remembered the prescient article "A day in the life of a rentier". Nine years later, I made it. Unbelievable. I got out of this circus. Admittedly, not completely. I still show up for about twenty hours a week at work and even a little more during the Chinese virus. But in my head I'm already no longer there. I've disconnected.
Last week for example, I was on a "video" (I hate the term and even more the concept). Behind my screen, my face represented me, while the rest of my being, physical, psychic, spiritual was waiting to be able to click on the "Leave the meeting" button. I noticed that it was even easier to act when we could judge our performance in real time thanks to the camera. This is probably the only good side of the virus. We could also add the mask which also allows us to "hide" during "in-person" sessions (I hate the term just as much and there too the concept).
As much as "classic" sessions are boring, "video" sessions are deadly. The exchanges are difficult and not very friendly. The speaking is very often focused on a very small number of people. Sometimes even just one. Being outside the work context, the topics of discussion seem even more meaningless. I am always amazed by the interest and commitment of some people during these events. It seems like their life depends on it. On the one hand, that may be it (which goes in the direction of the first paragraph).
These little events remind me of the good memories of the Rat Race and I'm having fun with it today. Now I'm having fun with my little independent side business that is slowly but surely taking off. The three terms are essential: activity because I don't feel like I'm working (quite the opposite, I'm having fun), accessory because I want to limit it to about ten hours a week and independent, because I am my only boss.
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For my part, I much prefer conference calls to video conferences: at least it allows you to follow the stock market while others waste their energy debating the optimal size of the PV margins...
Question: Since you're still at work but your head isn't really in it anymore, aren't the days even longer and more boring?
dying of laughter
Oh yes and that's why I can't wait to finish it
It's a bit like when you go on vacation... the last week of work seems endless
Don't mess around. The margin of the PV is super important! 🙂
I love zoom.. it allows you to do other things (after having defined this margin of PV we agree) like reading this article for example…
and it's always funny when you're doing something else and someone asks you a question :)
Personally, whether I'm on the phone or my camera is on, I don't mind watching the latest stock market surges, sports news or playing chess. Frankly, I don't need to see the faces of my boss and colleagues to listen to endless discussions, even when I have to intervene.
My baby is due in June and after my paternity leave, I have the right to take a sabbatical year. So it will be a little over a year, away from work, that I will have the opportunity to spend taking care of the family, but also to take care of my training and my personal projects. I would still like to have a small job for fun. I would like to be a bike messenger, especially since I will be spending a good part of my time in a city that I love: Frankfurt. It would work my legs and it would be a good way, I think, to improve my German!
Pure happiness. You will be able to enjoy your child, take your mind off things and enjoy the life of financial independence.
Then there is an aspect that you never take into account: the fact that sometimes maybe a person likes their job 🙂 I regularly read your articles on what you call the rat race and the fact that you are looking to change your life, I am myself someone whose work is not the number 1 priority (yet I like what I do, I am in the video game (ubisoft) and I like my job), my priorities being rather my family and my hobbies. But on the other hand I do not criticize at all those who are 100% invested in their job, it is another conception of life, it is not mine, but I do not say that it is not the right one, that they are blinded, that they are all wrong and that I am right.
I tend to agree with your outlook on life as far as work is concerned, but I find that you lack a bit of tolerance.
I am fully aware of this and I would never allow myself to be intolerant of those who love their job. They are lucky and that is also what I am looking for through my little sideline. I get a kick out of it. I understand 100% a person like you who does a job that is obviously exciting and for me it is not Rat Race. Your job is a passion for which you are paid. What more could you ask for. What I criticize is the way the world of work increasingly works today, which precisely removes all meaning from our actions. The accumulation of sessions, videoconferences, procedures, audits, etc. This completely distorts the job that we chose at the base. Personally, I need to be able to feel useful and/or achieve tangible things. Not to discuss for 3 hours on article xxx of a regulation or procedure. And it is perhaps in relation to this point in particular that I am more intolerant, in relation to certain people. I recognize it.
I completely agree with Psycoke, in the sense that one can like - or not - one's work (the activity itself, the structure [company or other organization], its values, one's possible colleagues, bosses, subordinates, clients, suppliers, the meetings, the solitude, the possible travel or other trips, the means made available, etc.), whether or not it is a priority in one's life.
However, even if one likes one's job or certain elements of it, it is probably difficult to imagine one without certain constraints or disadvantages, of whatever nature, that one could do without. The ideal job, without constraints or disadvantages, bringing only satisfaction and fulfillment, probably does not exist or must be rare. The trick is to find the job that, once everything is well balanced and weighted, leans more towards the positive side than the negative side. And a job that pleases at a time T may be less attractive at a time T+x, if parameters of the equation change - whether due to endogenous or exogenous factors - or by weariness setting in over time.
I also note that the appreciation of a work is not universal and depends on the individual. What pleases some people displeases others. And I would say that this is all the better.
Without having reread everything that Jerome has written, I don't have the impression that he is criticizing the people involved consciously or not in the "Rat Race" (ultimately, which is not in whole or in part) but a system and the individuals who set it up, use it in the pursuit of their interests or make it senseless. Jerome will confirm, or not.
The paradox is that to get out (but can we get out of it completely?) of the "Rat Race", we must use it. How are the profits produced, which allow us to create value and pay dividends (including for the benefit of the actors of the Rat Race, who count at least on their pension fund, their retirement annuity, their life insurance, etc.)? Getting out of the "Rat Race" more or less is only possible if it exists (a clear truism).
That's exactly it, as I explained in my last answer. It's this mixture of alienation of work and depersonalization of tasks that has worn me down in the long run. It's the system that I look at critically first, but this system is itself carried by certain individuals.
Exactly. I was already talking about it seven years ago (it's crazy how quickly time goes by!): https://www.dividendes.ch/2013/11/le-chemin-schizophrene-de-lindependance-financiere/
I am lucky not to have a job where endless and senseless discussions are not commonplace.
But when I read how Jérôme, Dividindes and many other people describe (caricature?) professional conferences and teleconferences, I tell myself that the structures of companies or other organizations still have great potential to improve their efficiency! What a waste of working hours, it seems!
For my part, I have a memory that comes back to me now. About ten years ago or a little more, I attended a conference bringing together about ten people in the premises of a large multinational company. The participants were all employees of this company, except me and one other person. In the end, 3 people - not me - had monopolized the speaking time, the others listening, looking attentive, taking a few notes. The time seemed long to me. The person who was leading the session kept up the pace for 2 (or 3?) hours, before ending it at noon sharp (!) and inviting everyone to an excellent table in the house restaurant reserved for special occasions and "high-ranking officers". I remember thinking that the session leader had shown great skill in dragging out the session until mealtime, seemingly insignificantly. A great art.
I could give you loads of examples like this. Yes, it's mastery, but what a waste of time and what a bore!!! Today, these types of sessions weigh down a large part of the specifications of many employees. The rest of the time is devoted to dealing with the hundreds of emails that arrive tirelessly...
Yeah 🙂 Thanks!
What do you think about the many bubbles that are bursting everywhere? In America anyway. GameStop, Nokia, Blackberry, AMC? I think that "mere teenagers" are generating a certain panic within some financial institutions and that's good for them! I find it really funny. But I think it's causing a certain feverishness in the whole market too...
I think we went back to 2000. I don't know if you knew that period but it was like today. The same kind of stocks that make losses and explode. It's funny that Nokia is coming back to the forefront. It was one of the hot stocks of the time. There was also "Palm" which was highly speculative and ended very badly, replaced by Blackberry precisely... The financial world has a very short memory. As you say, they are simple "teenagers", at least in their heads.
You can also put Tesla with it. And many others.
It remains to be seen whether this is the sign (finally) that we are at the end of a historic bull market, like in 2000. After all the time I have been waiting for this, I no longer dare to hope for it...
I also agree with Psycoke and with Jérome! For some people work can be a source of pleasure but there is a race to "do more with less" which is in some cases detestable and leads to astonishing consequences (health and environments) that even hyper-evolved societies allow to happen. No comment.
Man is a wolf to man… "The first occurrence of this expression is found in Plautus, in his comedy Asinaria (The Comedy of the Donkeys, around 195 BC, "source Wikipedia. 2000 years ago Plautus understood everything!
Okay I'll stop for the philosophy lol.
For the current situation I see a superposition of different elements.
Logical continuation of the evolution of QE: After loans (QE) and zero interest rates, corporate bond purchases, I present to you, to varying degrees, donations (tax) .. financed by QE, we agree. And for the moment, no inflation on the horizon, so no reason to stop these mechanisms. We are gently but surely exploring MMT. It will be difficult to stop the valves of easy or free money. Unfortunately for savers because in addition to no remuneration on savings, the logical exit door (in the medium or long term) should be inflation.
Short squeezes are linked to the checks that Americans receive, the democratization of free trading and mass media. It is certain that there are bubbles in this market but the situation is still very different from the Nasdaq in 2000 because Tech companies are making money (and in quantity!!). We have already had short squeezes in the past and some very significant ones. It is not negligible, billions are lost but I hope that it will remain an epiphenomenon for investors and that it will be mainly the HF and other players who short who will suffer these attacks.
Not all tech companies make money. The ones mentioned above are losing money (Nokia, Blackberry, etc.). Tesla is an automobile company, but I also put it in the speculative tech camp because it is a new technology. And as you say, it is the accommodative policies of the central banks that subsidize everything. I agree with you, inflation will return in the more or less long term. And then, those who were just making profits will collapse. So I continue to think that there are quite a few similarities with 2000. The only notable difference is the zero or negative rates that act as a crisis delayer. They treat the symptoms, but not the origins of the problem.
100% agree for these companies. I'm waiting for the moment of the deflation of the Tesla balloon!