No amount of “strategising” alters the basic fact that most work is, by its nature, crap work that the economy demands be done, by someone. The most talented/intelligent (etc) scramble over the pile in order that they don’t need to do it. That inherently leaves a multitude  for whom the idea of work providing ‘satisfaction’ (as opposed to just housing, food etc) is just not relevant. Indeed many Western countries (the US, Australia, Canada) import people for this very purpose. Most human imports are of course in a way ‘happy’ to do the work as a means out of more extreme poverty. But it doesn’t provide a scintilla of intrinsic satisfaction, and they’d dump it the moment they could afford to. 

But for the sake of argument, do you think the people who live according to your strategy are as happy as they would have been had they found a way to make work a source of satisfaction?

Those of you who are more fortunate may not quite believe this, but it’s demonstrably true. *We* all quit work the moment we can: when we retire, win the lottery, get some kind of sickness benefit, marry someone wealthy etc. You don’t notice this, because we’re invisible. We clean your offices, serve your food etc. 

I’ll stick with work-life balance, where that means keeping working hours as short as possible, so as to live as fully as possible in self-owned time.

“…human beings are deeply wired to create value…”

This wiring is what makes work/life balance an unattainable goal.  We can’t simply stop working once we leave the office, because we have an inner drive to accomplish things.  And because we think we’re not supposed to be working we feel guilty and overworked.  What a shame!

We have an incredible diversity of opportunities for creating value.  We can do it by improving our gardens, raising our kids, discussing philosophy with friends, etc.  Let’s put that work on a pedestal, where it belongs.  Let’s celebrate the diversity of ways we can create value.  Then our discussion can change from work/life balance to diversity in our lives.  I can’t help but think that we would feel much happier and lead richer lives with that discussion.