Comment on Attitudes
Glide@lemmy.ca 1 day agoSo, I’m a teacher, and I love my career. The fact that I get paid good money to hang out with teenagers and make a difference in so many lives is almost mind-boggling to me. But it’s still work. The job is exhausting, prep work and grading both suck, and I’m never happy to wake up at 7am. I’d never do it for free, and I’m always excited to have a day off.
The days off make me appreciate my job, and the shitty, boring parts of the job make me appreciate my time off. There’s a gap between “I love my job” and “my job isn’t even work,” and many people struggle to grasp that.
As an aside, the anti-work sentiment around here is less a rejection of engaging with a task that betters society, and more about the current system of work and pay, where our labour disproportionately benefits others. Most “anti-work” people want to have a task that adds value to the world, and despise aimless, soulless corporate tasks that benefit CEOs and share holders.
1984@lemmy.today 1 day ago
Im so surprised you like to hang out with teenagers when you are an adult…maybe you are in your 20s still.
But all my own memories from school was horrible so once i left that place, it was a huge relief to never be there again.
Burninator05@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
I’m in my mid-forties and most of my co-workers are in their early 20s. It can be weird but I don’t dislike it.
1984@lemmy.today 18 hours ago
Good. :)
Im sure you are making a difference. Mid-fourties means you have some life wisdom to share also.
Glide@lemmy.ca 14 hours ago
Honestly, it’s because I’m well into my 30s that I appreciate them. They give me perspective that I won’t find elsewhere in my life, and make me feel like my job is having a real impact. There are lives out there that are a little better for having me in them, and that feeds back into me, too. And being around them helps me from becoming some jaded old dude.
Obviously some of them annoy the shit out of me, and even the best of them has more energy than I can find over the course of the day. But I only have them until ~3 and then they go back to their parents and I get to relax. I think it’s easy find the good in every type of kid when you know that your time with them is fleeting.
And when I think about getting paid a salary to do this as opposed to anything else in the world? I mean, yeah, it feels like a genuine treat. I don’t have to come home tired and covered in sterilized grease the way I did in college, when I cooked my way through my degree, and I don’t need to come home physically worn and covered in motor oil the way my father did. Saying “I get to hang out with kids all day” is definitely downplaying the real work a bit, of which there is a ton, but at the end of the day, I really do genuinely feel lucky to have this way of living available to me.
1984@lemmy.today 12 hours ago
Thats very cool. I have always only worked office jobs, and they are quite boring. It seems to be like that in society that the people who really makes a difference for others get paid the least amount of money.
I think you are special souls who do jobs like that, not thinking of status or money whatsoever. And you do make a difference for the kids, obviously. I couldnt do it, because it takes a whole different level of patience and willingness to work in a quite chaotic environment… Its impressive. You are a good person. :)