How to think differently about our jobs

What really is a job?

I recently helped by mother move out of a house she’d been in for 35 years. Along with her came my father’s Oxford English Dictionary, the 32-pound edition that requires a magnifying glass. Heaven for a word-lover.

I’m a career coach, so of course I looked up the word, “job.” Fascinating etymology.

In the mid-1500s, a “job” was literally a cartload, the precise amount a horse and cart could carry at one time. 

What if we thought of our work, our job, as a cartload: 

• How much are we willing to carry today?

• How much are we able to carry today?

• What do I want in my cart?

• Is the cart spilling over? 

• Is the load slowing us down?

• Do the axles need some grease?

If we see our jobs more like finite cartloads, we’ll be more intentional about filling the capacity, and we’ll realize more quickly when ourselves and those we lead have no more space.