Towards a Better Life: The Wish to "Slow Down," but Will We Ever GET to?

People often talk about feeling like they are "always busy" and then we go on to say thing like "I really need to slow down!"

Right before I started writing this post, sat here for a moment and watched my cat, sleeping quietly in his basket next to me, on the desk. In many ways, cats are the ultimate reminders of slowing down.

But do we ever really get to slow down?

I wonder sometimes... especially as tomorrow is Labor Day, here in the USA... and many people will be laboring even though the day was created as a day of rest.

Having reached an age where I have a few gray hairs on my head, I can think back a few decades and remember how many of my friends and I would sit around and talk about things such as "working hard and retiring early," meaning maybe when we were still in our 40's.

Even in the late 1980's, that still seemed like at least a possibility, for many people. Thirty-some years later, the idea of getting to slow down... let alone retire, at all... seems more and more unlikely.

What happened to our world?

Sometimes I feel like we all drank the proverbial cultural kool-aid and agreed to become prisoners of this idea that we all need to work hard, all the time, 60 hours a week... or we will somehow "fall behind."

Of course, for many people, that has become a reality in the sense that they have to work that hard, in order to merely get by. The whole idea of "Dad goes to work and mom stays at home minding kids and the house" paradigm of the 1960's has become an extreme rarity because "Dad's job" in 2021 is unlikely to have the buying power to sustain a family, the way it did 50 years ago.

I don't really write these words as a complaint, nor as some kind of personal pity party, I write them more as a question of what exactly it IS we think we are doing? Or are hoping to accomplish?

Having rounded 60 years of age, I know that the idea of "retiring" is something I'd best just forget about, and there is no "pension" that's going to provide comfort in my ostensible "golden years."

Instead I find myself hoping that there are — and will be — enough "opportunities" like Steemit in the world that will permit those of us with independent minds enough "gigs" in the years ahead that we can at least stay afloat while doing fairly enjoyable things like writing and being part of the growing "Attention Economy."

It won't exactly be "slowing down," but at least it would be a lot better than digging ditches!

Thanks for reading, and have a great week ahead! If you're in a part of the world that celebrated Labor Day on Monday, I invite you to enjoy your day off!

How about YOU? Is there a Labor Day holiday where you are? Will you have Monday off from work? Or will you have to go to work, regardless? Do you think people in the decades ahead will actually get to RETIRE? Do leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!

(All text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is ORIGINAL CONTENT, created expressly for this platform — NOT A CROSSPOST!!!)
Created at 20210906 00:10 PDT
x247