Lately I’ve found myself thinking a lot about the consequences of COVID. It changed our lives, our country and the world in so many ways.
It felt like the nail in the coffin for states like California and New York while it gave new life to states like Florida and Texas.
I also don’t know that the George Floyd inspired Black Lives Matter movement would have been nearly as aggressive or widespread if everyone wasn’t cooped up that summer, spending way too much time online and bored out of their minds.
But perhaps most obviously, it seems like COVID was this major turning point for the American cost of living.
I remember seeing a reel about how much further a $50,000 salary went in 2019 than it does today, and it really put things in perspective in the worst possible way.
A creator went through his expenses and income then and now, and before the pandemic, he had plenty of money left over for leisure and savings but today, he’d be in debt with the same income and financial obligations.
And the more I think about all that’s changed for the worst, the more upsetting it becomes to me that one of the few positive changes hasn’t seemed to last.
The widespread normalization of remote work was probably the best thing to come out of 2020 by a long shot.
But 6 years later, finding a remote job feels like looking for a monogamous Frenchman.
And don’t get me wrong; I understand why employers became skeptical of it.
There were plenty of people that completely abused it, and took way too many liberties.
I think it’s an incredible privilege, and one that some people clearly just can’t handle.
But considering all that COVID took from us that still hasn’t been fixed, I can’t help but feel like the American people should be able to keep the one benefit that came from it.
After my faith, remote work has been responsible for the greatest positive change in my life.
The last time I worked in an office consistently was pre-COVID. And I loved where I worked and the people I worked with. I was laid off without warning 2 years ago, but still smile when I remember some of the shenanigans, inside jokes, work trips and happy hours we shared. I loved to chit chat, I loved getting dressed for work, and I loved the surprise free snacks and lunches that would show up in the break room.
But there’s very little I’d be willing to trade for the freedom, flexibility and dignity that working from home granted me.
I love being able to cook a fresh meal with real ingredients in the middle of the day for lunch. I love being able to easily take my lunch break at the gym and return to work. I love being able to knock out a chore between meetings.
Most of all, I love feeling like my time is spent intentionally as opposed to arbitrarily.
It’s not that I felt like a “wage slave” or anything like that when I was in an office Monday-Friday, but I feel like my life is much more whole, integrated and balanced than it ever was when I was at a cubicle every day.
I feel like my life actually belongs to me, and that I work to live instead of living to work.
When you work from home, I feel like the week also really opens up. You don’t feel like you have to pack all of your fun, leisure and errands into Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday because you don’t have to waste 3 hours of the rest of your days getting ready or fighting rush hour traffic.
When we had to spend anywhere from 6 months to 2 years of our lives in our homes and playing Simon Says with the government depending on where we lived, I don’t understand why some people are so committed to making sure we spend the rest of our precious and fleeting lives under fluorescent lighting for no good reason.
If you can get the same work done in a sterile, corporate building that you can get done at a bench on the beach or at a cozy coffee shop or in a botanical backyard, why do employers insist on the most miserable option?
When people talk about the European way of life and orientation towards work, I can’t help but roll my eyes sometimes. I don’t know that a mandatory siesta or 4 month vacation is something that America should adopt.
I think we should work hard and I think we should live well, but I think for too long we’ve overemphasized the former and underemphasized the latter. And I think remote work is one of the most obvious remedies.
It also seemed to me like conservative companies were more eager to return to the office than their liberal counterparts. And with all of the talk about the importance of the family, it didn’t really make sense to me. With the way the economy has been trending since COVID and will keep trending since our leaders are committed to wars we can’t afford, most couples can’t realistically afford a single income household. But remote work always struck me as the next best thing, allowing parents to keep money coming in without having to outsource childcare.
This might be controversial, but I also feel like remote work makes it easier for women to maintain their femininity. Climbing the corporate ladder can make some women feel like they have to impersonate men to succeed and I think being untethered from an office helps mitigate and soften some of those unintended consequences.
I remember a clip I saw of Donald Trump talking about the dissolution of his first marriage, and say what you will about him, but I think he articulated the phenomenon better than I ever could in this interview.
“Ivana would get angry at somebody over the telephone, all of a sudden…and she’d start shouting. And I’d say, ‘I don’t want my wife shouting at somebody like that, I really don’t want that. And a softness disappeared. There was a great softness to Ivana, and she still has that softness, but during this period of time, she became an executive not a wife.”
And mind you, I deeply cherish the right to work as a woman. You’ll never find me lamenting the fact that I have more options than falling in love as a teenager or marrying some random creep for security when I turned 22.
I believe in accountability, and I’m sure that systems exist out there to enforce it. If someone proves they can’t be trusted to fulfill the duties of their job from home, they don’t deserve the perk.
But work is difficult by design. After the original sin, God told us that we would struggle to survive, and that’s exactly what work is. No matter what you do, who you do it for, or how much you genuinely enjoy it, I think everyone will be challenged by their profession in one way or another. And if this is what work is by default, I don’t know why so many seem hellbent on making it worse than it has to be with a key fob and parking spot.
what do you think?