Last month, I published a three part interview with creator, author and podcaster Paul Millerd.

I was delighted that Paul said yes to the interview and even more delighted with the interview itself.

Judging by the feedback, it seems a lot of you were also left thinking “I need more Paul in my life”.

Anyway, I’m not about to reprint the interview.

But one small section is worth a second look:

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Tom: Could you share one or two interesting real-life Pathless Path stories?

Paul: Oh man - there are so many. I think yours is a great one because it involves going back into a job and being happy about it. And that’s the coolest thing to see, people improving their relationship to work. But more generally, my podcast and newsletter both have tons of stories.

***

One phrase in Paul's answer really stood out.

Paul didn’t say “the coolest thing to see is people improving their work”.

Instead, Paul said “the coolest thing to see is people improving their relationship to work”.

This is a subtle but important difference.

It’s also not something I’d ever thought much about until a couple of years ago.

It never dawned on me I could improve my relationship with my job rather than improving my job.

It didn’t even dawn on me that I DID have a relationship with my job!

I always thought relationships were something that happened between two people. Like the relationship I have with my 6 week old daughter or with Lozzadog Lauren.

But a relationship with work?

That’s never how it looked to me.

As I've come to see though, we’re in relationship with every single part of our lives, whether we realise it or not.

Each and every day I’m in a relationship with my thoughts, my emotions, my expectations, my desires, the past, the future, time, achievement, failure, feedback, success, routine, rest, discomfort, silence, uncertainty, money, my body, my phone and social media.

I've picked a few examples which are barely scratching the surface.

But it’s a surface that’s well worth scratching.

We can’t always control or change the object when we’re in a subject/object relationship. But we do have some say over our relationship with that object.

i.e. how we see it, feel about it, respond to it and interact with it.

And when we start to shift our relationship to something, that something starts to shift too.

So before I wrap this email up, back to work and a short thought experiment which might be helpful if you'd like a more fun, fulfilling and even flirty relationship with your job:

Imagine for a moment that your job is a person.

What kind of relationship do you have?

Is it like an over-clingy friend who messages you day & night and the only reason you haven’t blocked them is because you’ve known them for 20 years?

Is it like an uncle your hardly see? You’re not quite sure who he is and what he does?

Or is it like a long-distance relationship? Emotionally you checked out months ago but physically you’re still on all the Zoom calls?

Whatever it is, here’s the second, more important question:

What sort of relationship would you love to have with that person? 

a.k.a. with your job?

I’m not going to give you the answers to this one. It’s a question for you to figure out for yourself.

But it’s the question you want to be asking. Sometimes getting clear on what you want is all that’s really needed.

Talking of which:

If you’re curious about what a fun, fulfilling and flirty relationship with work might look like for you, I can help with that.

Here’s where to go next:

https://waitinglist.followingfulfilment.com