We in the West have been sold the dream that winning the lottery would allow us to retire on an island and live a life of infinite leisure. The modern version of this dream is to work a four-hour day or even a four-hour week. It’s a clever sleight of hand that tricks us into believing financial abundance can mask a deep-seated void in well-being.
The reality is that tackling problems that matter is a primal need — contentment is only possible once you have found a challenge that matters to you. It’s no different than any other essential need you have. If you do not exercise for a long time, your muscles begin to atrophy. If you receive endless praise, your capacity to improve is diminished. Growth is impossible in the absence of friction. Unbridled positivity invariably produces stagnation. Ignoring what matters to you might not cause immediate discomfort, but the eventual pain is far greater than any temporary difficulty you’d face from pursuing something meaningful.
Many cultures do not suffer from the misguided dream of retiring on an island. In fact, there’s no word for “retirement” in some of these cultures, which helps explain why many never retire. They keep doing what they love for as long as their health allows. In Okinawa, Japan, the community embraces this idea, constantly telling each other, “You count; we need you; let’s do something of value together.” This mindset is summarized by the word ikigai, which loosely translates to “a reason for being.” The practice of ikigai is a key reason Okinawa has one of the world’s highest percentages of people living to over a hundred. Imagine doing meaningful work that you love and, as a result, living for more than a hundred years.
Despite clear evidence in Japan, Western culture still uses money as a fundamental benchmark of success. Money is a useful resource that creates comfortable outer experiences. It’s not evil; it’s useful. It’s perfectly reasonable to aspire to it.
But when it comes to distinguishing between true wealth and miserable poverty, money is a misleading measure of wealth. The poorest life is not the life of someone with little money. Once essential needs are met, the poorest life is one in which you clearly know what energizes you, but for some reason, you deny yourself the opportunity to live the life that makes you tremble with possibility.
Reject the oversimplified versions of success fed to you on social media and define success in your own terms. True wealth is found in doing things purely because they are worth doing. True wealth is the experience of choosing your work.
This article is an excerpt from Chapter 9 of Choose Your Work
Footnotes
If you do not exercise for a long time, your muscles begin to atrophy: A study on the effects of reduced physical activity found that reducing the number of steps individuals took per day resulted in “significant muscle atrophy… in both young and older adults.” Kelly A. Bowden Davies et al., “Reduced Physical Activity in Young and Older Adults: Metabolic and Musculoskeletal Implications,” Therapeutic Advances in Endocrinology and Metabolism 10 (2019): 2042018819888824, https://doi.org/10.1177/20420188198888824.
Growth is impossible in the absence of friction: Life’s difficulties often can lead to personal growth. One study found that following an adverse experience, our character can broaden. This includes “intellectual humility, open-mindedness to diverse perspectives on an issue, understanding the multiple ways in which situations may unfold, and empathy.” Eranda Jayawickreme et al., “Post-Traumatic Growth as Positive Personality Change: Challenges, Opportunities, and Recommendations,” Journal of Personality 89, no. 1 (2021): 145–65, https://doi.org/10.1111/jopy.12591.
Many cultures do not suffer from the misguided dream of retiring on an island: In many cultures, retirement doesn’t exist in the traditional sense, or it is understood in a way that differs from the Western perspective.
The Japanese usually encourage others not to retire because “those who give up the things they love doing and do well lose their purpose in life.” Héctor García and Francesc Miralles, Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life (New York: Penguin Books, 2017), 184.
For agrarian societies in the Andes, “retirement is a word unknown… Healthy people continue to labor, although in reduced form, for as long as they are physically able.” Mark R. Luborsky and Ian M. LeBlanc, “Cross-Cultural Perspectives on the Concept of Retirement: An Analytic Redefinition,” Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology 18, no. 4 (2003): 251–71, https://doi.org/10.1023/B:JCCG.0000004898.24738.7b.
This mindset is summarized by the word ikigai, which loosely translates to “a reason for being.” Héctor García and Francesc Miralles, Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life (New York: Penguin Books, 2017), 9.
The practice of ikigai is a key reason Okinawa has one of the world’s highest percentages of people living to over a hundred: Héctor García and Francesc Miralles, Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life (New York: Penguin Books, 2017), 12.
Sadly, in other parts of Japan, people have been known to die from overworking. This is known as “Karoshi syndrome” and contributes to over 750,000 deaths a year globally, according to a joint study between the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO). Karoshi syndrome is attributed to “long working hours, job-related stress, and poor work-life balance.” Haitham Ahmed Al-Madhagi, “Unveiling the Global Surge: Unravelling the Factors Fuelling the Spread of Karoshi Syndrome,” Risk Management and Healthcare Policy 16 (2023): 2779–82, https://doi.org/10.2147/RMHP.S444900.
Dan Dobos writes about decision making, personal growth, human potential, fulfillment and helping people choose the work that they are meant to do. He is the author of Choose Your Work.