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On the one hand boredom, on the other hand fear of financial imponderables: How can life and job become more interesting again?
Photo: Btihal Remli / Moment RF / Getty Images
Gisela, 36 years old, asks: »I've been working for the same company for 13 years. My father was already there and always said to me: Take something safe, then you can act out your crazy nonsense privately. Now I'm a forwarding agent and my feet are falling asleep. But whenever I think of a trace of madness, then enters my father like a Punch and Judy puppet theater in my brain and krakeelt:
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Take something safe.
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How can I get rid of it?
Or should I stay bored, but not poor in old age? "
Dear Gisela,
Your grief is somewhat reminiscent of the old Juliane Werding songs, who sang »Sehnsucht ist incurable« in the eighties and lyrically praised the devoted, hunched woman, trapped in the system.
When she looked in the mirror one morning, strangely, she did not recognize herself. 30 years on the face, honestly, but it didn't fit because her heart was only 17.
The values that you have soaked up with your breast milk or your father's admonitions are not so easy to shake off.
Do you feel liberated when you do something really crazy - or baseless?
Do you find the content of your work boring so that you would like to continue your education, for example to become a transport specialist?
Then further options would be open to you for the next step in your career.
Does the prospect of something new, but also more work, give you anticipation or fear?
Are you just exhausted at the moment, so that a cure would help, a sabbatical or, crazy, a trip around the world?
Sometimes it also helps to change the domestic circumstances and thus relieve the burden: How about hiring a domestic help?
Or do you think that you now need a complete career break in order to feel unreasonable, that is, alive?
Well-dosed excitement with micro-adventures
However, you can also do unreasonable things if you keep a secure corset: Travel haphazardly, go on blind dates, read books that you did not buy at first glance, but were recommended.
Micro-adventures are a new trend that can also be used to soften work routines.
Where can you stay the night in a strange place in your own city?
Perhaps you will ask for a company of your size in your city's twin town.
Could an exchange be organized?
Freight forwarding and mobility are two closely related siblings, so why not use that too?
Some companies even do this with support in order to get a new training impulse without having to question the entire position.
If it is still not enough, you can live out this feeling in a little extra income.
There is a woman here in Hamburg who bakes macarons in her free time and offers various baking courses on these little delicacies.
The money she makes with the calorie bombs is the vacation fund for next year.
So that she always knows: if I take in a lot, it becomes more distant and luxurious, if I take in little, my daily livelihood is still not at risk.
I'm not saying you should bake macarons now, but looking for a paid hobby helps to reconcile the belief "take something safe" with the assumption "I'm only alive when I do something crazy" .
It is easier to find the positive side of a belief and to honor it than to go in search of something completely alien to your character, contrary to your biography - you will fail sooner or later because it does not suit you.
She still saw herself driving in a convertible with the wind in her hair open - longing is incurable.
For your consolation: it is not always the crazy who are satisfied.
