Why People Are Ditching The 9-5

A little over a week ago, I awoke to the startling news that my mum QUIT her job. In her words: “I’m recalibrating my life.” The only problem is my mum is not a spontaneous person.

So what’s going on? These days millennials are not putting down roots and buying homes, mums (and dads) are quitting jobs they’ve had for decades and grandparents are the life of the party at discos and travelling the world instead of staying at home.

Where did this inter-generational shift in our culture come from? Why are people ditching the 9-5?

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We Have More Lifestyle Choices

Simply put, there are loads of other things to do. You don’t have to work behind a desk with people you avoid at the supermarket if you don’t want to.

What makes life quite delicious and overwhelming at the same time is the powerful ability to choose.

I watched a video the other day in which a few women over the age of 60 confessed that they could never imagine growing up in the 21st century. Unanimously, they felt that there are far too many options today–that choosing one’s vocation seemed to be a simpler task when they were growing up.

In contrast, many of us probably could not imagine what our world would look like without all the opportunities we enjoy and so often expect.

All Generations Want To Participate In This New Way of Living

Changing one’s career path more than once is common amongst young professionals. The idea of staying in the same field with the same company until one retires is no longer the order of the day.

Potential employees seek culture and a dynamic work environment because there are already numerous companies out there reinventing the wheel.

By volunteering, I have met countless medical practitioners, PhD holders, graphic designers, teachers, nurses, engineers, parents and grandparents of all ages who left their former lives behind in search of a new way of working.

Many of these career sojourners even credit their generation with paving the way to where we are now in terms of diversity of lifestyles.

The 9-5 Life Alone Is No Longer Good Enough

I don’t have to convince you that we live in a world of digital transformation and that global cultures have been uniquely connected as a result.

The very fact that you are reading this post–a post which was written by a Bahamian in Scotland on a laptop by a Japanese multinational conglomerate given to me whilst in California by my Chinese best friend–is already proof enough!

We can use our social media and our own eyes when we travel to learn how others live, eat (as I highlight in Eating As The Locals Do) and work. We can adopt life hacks from around the world.

Similarly, we can learn that there’s more than one way to define work whether that be on a laptop with a strong WiFi connection, accompanying a young woman with Down’s Syndrome to town or building a sustainable structure in the middle of nowhere.

I’ve been moaning to my mum since I began volunteering that one job in one country is not enough. Concerned, she disagreed. What I really meant was that there’s far too much opportunity out there to settle in one place for long. Maybe it’s the fear of missing out or maybe it’s the experience of continuously moving around that fuels this.

I seriously doubt my whingeing brought this on but my mum is officially unemployed. Despite the fact that she’s encroaching on my lifestyle, I hope she’s happy.

In her words: “I’ve missed too much trying to make a living. Now I’m going to live.”

I’m not the only dramatic one in the family.

Yours in rebellion,

B the travelling MS x