Attention, Please!

Most of us are guilty of "living to work" instead of "working to live". We fail to see the thin line between the two and usually suffer the consequences especially when it comes to relationships. There are many types of people who get themselves stuck in this situation. Certain people (workaholics) put their heart and soul into their jobs, naturally because they are in love with their job. It keeps them going, puts a smile on their faces every morning, and it's simply a part of who they are or who they’ve become. Therefore, they feel they don’t have any space in their lives to accommodate relationships.

Others use it as a distraction, an escape from the reality of their loneliness. Sometimes it seems easier to bury yourself in work, in order to avoid facing the truth. These people may come off as antisocial or shy by seeking comfort in their jobs, however they don’t want to be lonely, no one does.

It’s great to invest in your passion and work hard at it to succeed, but that seems more like a short-term goal. And for many people, their short-term goal becomes their long-term goal over time. There are so many different aspects of life, that many of us are too busy to live.

Eventually people form relationships, and relationships themselves are a full-time job. Most of us don't realize that relationships require actual work. Some of us try to share the love for our job with loving our significant others. Often expecting our loved ones to understand, since the job pays the bills.

Our jobs aren’t the only thing that defines us, relationships define us as well. While in a relationship we learn a lot, whether good or bad, and we pick up skills that allow us to grow and mature. Experience is required for most jobs, as well as in relationships. Starting a job with no prior experience can be difficult, as well as going into a relationship with no experience. While gaining experience at work, we could be gaining experience from the people that come into our lives.

Some people have beautiful families, a great wife or husband and amazing kids, yet they choose to spend most of their time at work. Already they’ve consciously chosen work over family. Paying attention to family is more important than paying the bills. And when their family realizes that, it causes a lot of damage. A simple question with a simple answer can put things into perspective: Is my job worth more than my family? Time goes fast, it doesn’t wait for anyone, and can stop at any time. Making each moment count, especially with our love ones is very important.

Every relationship needs attention to grow, just like our jobs need attention to succeed. Either way we must face ourselves, figure out what we want and which order our priorities should be in. Just like jobs, love comes and go, however sometimes we get lucky enough to meet the right people. Once we push the right people away, we may never get that chance again. Love shouldn't go straight to work; it should stay in your relationship as well.

Are we really going to look back when we’re on our death beds, proud of the promotion we got years ago and all the money we made? The money we made isn’t going to be by our bed side, holding our hands and giving us the love and attention we need. The money we earned will eventually become useless at a certain point in our lives. We can’t use money to replace the slots in our lives that are meant for people. When we realize how busy we were trying to further our careers instead of enjoying life with our loved ones, it would be too late.

We must find the balance between work and life, work can't be the only thing we were created in this world to do.

Which are you and are you living to work or working to live?