What Are We In Labor Of?

I am woman. And I make money. I labor.

I am not in labor via giving birth to a human, I am part of the labor force (and forced it feels).

Stealth is it. My hopes and dreams of offering my gifts to the world via the workforce have now turned into what feels like a forced effort to make money: labor [exerted, strenuous force]. 

What am I in labor of?

Am I giving birth to anything meaningful? Is my birthing given to all things clickbait via the expansive (and expensive) worldwide web; and “The Storks” now deliver Amazon packages?

Is my labor given over to nurture, grow, and raise Amazon, Google, and all things that demand my purchasing “power”? Is this the empowerment I am after—purchasing power?

Do we labor under a mistake? As Thoreau tells us: That we are laying up treasures which moth and rust will corrupt and thieves break through and steal.

I am not making babies; I am making money; and for the most part, I don’t know what to do with it.

Pay bills of course, but is that what I labor for? Is my life about paying bills and purchasing power?

Growing up, my mind understood work and money to be for men. My father worked; he made money. My mother stayed home with three children and used that money for food, clothes, and shelter.

As a woman, making money confuses my mind. Laboring for money (it’s what I do) confuses me. What am I doing? When I take a deep breath and look closely: I don’t really know, so I inquire—I get curious as to why I don’t know.

Not knowing is fertile ground for knowing.

Thank you that we no longer labor 12 hours a day, seven days a week; that which Labor Day represents.

It was inhumane to labor a human for that many hours, but at what point is it inhumane to labor a human at 40 hours a week in meaningless labor and with dead-end wages of not enough?

What is this laboring about? What is money really about? And what is enough?

What are our (if any) moral obligations to money? Pay bills, spend, save, and give away the rest? And to whom do we give? To the less fortunate? Do I have a fortune to give the less fortunate? Is ten percent a safe pass to get into heaven’s gates? And why is the world calling my money into the cart?

Am I fortunate that I can fill up my virtual cart? Is this what I am to be thankful for this Labor Day?

The world I once wanted to dance and sing in, is trying to program my mind to all things I don’t need.

What am I buying? What am I buying into this Labor Day?

What’s the meaning of labor and money these days, and how do they fit in our mind?

Lest we let the world of consumption program our minds. Stealth it is.

What I really want to buy into is a beautiful world filled with beautiful people. (my pipe dream)

HOW CAN I MAKE PEOPLE INTERNALLY BEAUTIFUL?

I want to seek beauty, find it, and discover it (in people). I don’t want to make or buy beauty products. I don’t want to show you how beautiful this face looks in magical lights. Nor do I want to influence you to buy more stuff. Addicted to products that make us look beautiful (stealth it is).

I want to buy into unpurchasable beauty. Therefore, I need my work and my money to align with this desire. If my work and money are aligned with the world of more stuff, more things, more money, more purchase power, pay bills, more bills, etcetera—what am I selling the time of my life to? Where is the beauty in that?

The power of priceless matters is becoming lost, forgotten, neglected, and rejected in the world of labor days, and replaced with purchasing power.  I can’t say this is inhumane, but I can say that it knocks the humanity out of you.

Can we learn to let money serve a more beautiful world, but only second to that which first serves human betterment?

Can we first get curious about a beautiful world without money, and then, use money to serve that vision?

If we saw money as seeds, and looked at where those seeds are planted – at where we plant seeds of money; are those seeds bringing us that which gives us Life (with a capital L) – are those seeds producing fruitful fruit?

Follow the money (they say), as a means to know what is going on in the world, but what if we followed our own money?

Is there deadness in how we earn money and what we give our money to?

Do we really need more money to serve human betterment? Or do we just need more humans who understand priceless matters?

Underneath these questions we will find answers worthy of pursuit.