One thing I love about working for myself is greater freedom to choose how I spend my money.
This might sound daft because I don’t have a salary any more…
And my business income is irregular.
So let me explain...
When I was employed, it annoyed me that my employer still controlled my spending…
Even after I got paid.
Because the truth is…
Once my salary arrived in my bank account…
It still wasn’t mine.
My employer still took a big chunk.
How do I mean?
Well, I needed a suit.
I needed a smart pair of shoes…
And I needed work shirts…
Washed, ironed and neatly pressed.
This all costs money…
And this all costs time.
And none of these were optional. I couldn’t do my job without them.
But the funny thing was…
I only spent this time and money because of my job.
My job gave me a salary with one hand…
And took some of it back with the other.
Another way of saying this is I was paying to be in my job…
Or even “paying to be paid”.
Which to my mind is pretty bonkers.
Now, maybe things are changing.
Working from home is an example.
People don’t need work clothes as much.
They can work in their favourite pyjamas instead…
And this is a good thing.
But I think “paying to be paid” goes deeper than this.
In the same way we spend financial capital to get paid…
We spend other types of capital too.
I know this was true while I was employed.
Working long hours meant I spent mental capital…
…through stress and lack of sleep.
I spent physical capital…
…through headaches and sitting on my bum all day, staring at a screen.
I spent relationship capital…
…as I was often too busy to see friends and family.
And I spent emotional capital….
…as I could feel my happiness slowly ebbing away.
And guess what?
I’d then use more of the financial capital I’d earned trying to get this all back.
I spent money on meditation apps or sleeping pills to try to sleep better…
I bought nice gifts for friends and family to make up for the time I wasn’t spending with them…
And I joined a swanky gym to try to shortcut my way to physical fitness.
Now, some of this was lifestyle creep – spending more as I started earning more.
(this is an email for another day)
But some of this was trying to reclaim what I’d lost because of my job.
It made me wonder – what was my salary really funding?
And the reality was…
A good chunk of my salary was funding itself.
If I cut out everything I spent money on because of my job…
I wouldn’t need to earn anywhere near as much…
And could still live the kind of life I wanted to live.
Having a corporate job wasn’t the solution…
It was the problem.
People talk about the idea of the “hamster wheel” and I totally get it.
I thought that if I ran faster on the wheel…
By working harder…
And getting paid more…
I could break free from this.
But all that happens is the wheel starts spinning faster…
And you can never win.
Does this make sense?
Do you agree?
Either way, perhaps just something to be aware of.
On which note I’m going to wrap this up …
Have a great weekend.
- Tom
p.s. If you’re ready to get greater clarity on your situation, why not book a short call with me? The link is here. I’d love to chat.