Essence Lost

Once you’re out of college and you begin your quest through the maze of corporate servitude, you will begin to notice many changes in yourself.  When you really think about this it makes perfect sense.  Most of the places that we are sentenced to work are extremely drab, to say the least. Most work environments don’t promote creativity, especially in my field. It’s almost as if there is a interior design template for the cubicle populated buildings I have been sentenced to work in. The sole purpose of this template is to rob people of their individuality.  I have been in some office buildings that are extremely nice, but even still they are not places that evoke a feeling of creativity.  Both, my last job and current job were horrible in terms of overall aesthetics.  My first job was in a building with no windows, grayish whitish walls, with the ugliest grey carpet you have ever thought of, oh, and did I mention that the cubicles where faded purple; my current job is much similar except for the fact that they’re are windows, but those who sit by them always keep the blinds shut.

You may be asking why I am spending so much time talking about how my work environment looks,  I do this to warn you, these environments have a detrimental effect on ones essence.  What is essence? Your essence is the numerous things that encompass everything about you.  Some might call it swagger, I simply hate that word, so you will rarely hear me use it, plus swagger implies something cool, everyone’s essence isn’t necessarily “cool”, especially since cool is subjective, but it is unique to them.  Your essence includes things like how you dress, how you talk, your physical appearance, your likes, hobbies, dislikes; it is not something that makes you cool or un-cool, as much as it makes you you. Yes, I know I sound rather abstract in my description, such is life.  For example if someone likes to dress “nicely” that is a part of their essence just as much as if someone likes to play magic cards. Although I think magic cards are the epitome of dorkiness, someone likes them and that is a part of their essence just as much as dressing nicely is a part of mine.

Once you start working that good ol 9 to 5 say goodbye to your essence if you are not careful.  It took me a while to notice that mine was drifting away.  First I noticed that I was putting on a little bit of weight.  Next I was getting my hair cut less and less. I started caring less and less about what I was wearing to work.  I used to be heavy into music, and I wasn’t listening to it as much as I used to, and I wasn’t on the look out for live concerts the way I used to. Simply put, I feel like I was/am falling off.   Some may argue that I was maturing, I have to disagree.  There is a difference between a maturing of the essence and a loosing of the essence.  Maturing is inevitable, and over time people may not mind maturing.  A loss of essence is what occurs when you wake up one morning, look in the mirror and you don’t feel happy about what you are becoming.

I really got scared about the whole essence thing once I really started to pay attention to some of my co-workers, especially when I went out of town on a business trip with some of them.  A lot of my older colleagues told me stories about their college days, and things they used to do, and want to do and I started to think, wow, these guys are not completely uncool.  How is it that my first impression of them was that they were boring wack individuals that only cared about the good of the companies they slaved for? It’s because they spent the last 20 years serving corporate sentences, which in turn began to mask their underlying essence with wackness.  Its like I could tell these guys use to be interesting cool guys back “in their day”, they went from that to tucking their t-shirts into their jeans…its just a sad sad sight that I refuse to let happen to me.

How can you keep your essence? Its a great question, here are a few of the things I am trying to incorporate into my life so that I do not become a monotonous corporate crony:

1. Try to exercise regularly, even if it is just for 20 minutes a day.  You will feel much better in the long run.  It is a struggle to keep this one up, I myself have put on nearly 25 lbs since I started working.
2. Try to spend some time each week keeping up with something that you feel passionate about.
3. Maintain your appearance (if this is something you consider a characteristic of your essence).
4. Try to find a project to work on on the side that utilizes your creative talents, creative thinkers shape the world, corporate drones just live in it.
5. Spend a little time keeping up with things you think are fly.  If you like magic cards, spend a little time finding out whats new in the world of magic. If you like sneakers spend a little time knowing whats new in the world of footwear. If you like music hit a concert or get some new mp3s.
6. Don’t distance yourself from your true friends, its really easy to allow work to consume your life..try to keep lasting positive relationships in tact.
7. Make your living space as fly and creative as possible.  You spend nearly 40 hours a week at work, most people don’t have the luxury of serving their corporate sentences in beautiful environments, make sure that home is as creative as possible, coming back to a creative home and maintaining a creative home will go a long way with helping you maintain your essence.

if you can think of anything else please feel free to post in the comments section.