[lpsz]

Surprised to see such a non-imaginative viewpoint on HN.

Over what I feel like the last couple of decades, we've been taught that work == bad, life == good. You work because you have to, you trade time for money, you suffer from 9 to 5, you anxiously watch the clock, and then you go home and enjoy "life."

I think this is sad. There's nothing wrong at all with productive work, and putting best years of your life into doing something creative like building your life's business.

[raverbashing]

Work is good, sure, but there's more to life than it

[lpsz]

The point is that we've grown to mentally associate the word "work" with "doing chores for my boss because I have to." It's a dirty word, the way we use it.

What about redefining this word to mean, for some individuals at least, "I'm pursuing my dream"?

[ryandrake]

It's not just a mental association. It's reality for nearly everyone on the planet. For the vast majority, work is something you're paid for that you would otherwise not be doing. That's why they call what you get in return "compensation". It's to compensate you for the time you spend doing what you otherwise wouldn't.

If you get up in the morning to "pursue your dream" you're among a lucky fraction of a percent of the population.

[Retra]

Why? What do you think work is, if not worth living to do?

[IkmoIkmo]

Traveling to new places, having sex, exploring a new cuisine, going to a concert, hiking in nature, all of those things and a billion more you're surely familiar with, and you won't find them universally as part of this one particular job.

Work is fine, but doing nothing but work which is what Elizabeth's life seemingly alludes to, means you're missing out on all of the above. If you truly love life that way, so be it, to each their own, but for the vast majority of people life's desires are much less lopsided and there's a much bigger desire for a different balance. And that doesn't mean you have to hate your job. I like my work, I also like going home. Liking just working is like eating just bread n cheese and nothing else. I quite like it but I'm quite happy to eat other things, too.

Most of those people would even go so far as to liken a love for work and nothing but work, at all, as a sign of some kind of addiction. Can it be genuine love for a life spent just working? Well yes, absolutely, but knowing nothing else, I'd definitely be inclined to assume that a person who works, does nothing but work, is probably not fully aware of the richness that life outside of work offers, is scared or intimidated by it (it's easy to say no to love, or friends, or family, if it hurt you in the past, or say no to sports if you don't feel you fit in), or is somehow addicted to work in a way that's not completely free. Again, exceptions can exist, but those are reasonable assumptions when talking about such an extreme case of someone working and doing nothing but working for many years on end and no intention of stopping.

[Retra]

I think you're underestimating how much of that extra stuff is unavoidable in day-to-day life. But it's not hard to consider them all secondary to your goals, and there's no reason everyone should.

[IkmoIkmo]

Yes for a normal hard working person, we're talking about Elizabeth who doesn't 'hang out' with anyone except her brother who is an employee of hers, chooses to wear turtlenecks everyday (she says she has over 150 turtlenecks and has worn them since she was 8, calls it her uniform, and they're all the same color of course, black, I'm not making this shit up) so there's no need to make any decisions in the morning, eats vegan so she can function on less sleep, had a solitary childhood. Nowhere does that appear she merely loves her work and does 'extra stuff' because it's 'unavoidable' and considers them 'secondary'. That's one thing. It looks like she doesn't do the extra stuff at all, purposely avoids them and that there's nothing secondary to work because it's all she lives for. She works 7 days a week and says she literally works from the moment she wakes up to the moment she goes to bed and designed her life so she doesn't have to dwell on 'extra stuff' like what to wear, and so she can sleep less, doesn't date at all and hasn't been on vacation in ten years, you really think there's nothing else to life than that? Ridiculous. That's totally different from your everyday 'I love my job, I work 80 hours a week with pleasure and have a family, go on vacation, do sports and meet new people for fun, go dancing etc besides work'. You're describing the latter in which case yes, it's completely fine to consider sports or hobbies as secondary to work if work is your nr 1 hobby, but for her there's no secondary. There's work and then there's sleep and that's it, and she's doing everything she can to reduce the latter and make more efficient the former, and no matter what you may say, she is totally missing out on a shit ton of things. Of course it's a personal choice and I'm in favour of her having the ability to make it, obviously. Life is a game of trade offs and the choices she makes are hers and I admire them a lot on some level, but let's not pretend there's no tradeoff here, life is clearly more than work, that's what Raverbashing said, you asked why, and I explained, it's as clear as day there's much more to life than the 7 day, 100% of her waking hours working work schedule, it's an objective fact you can't challenge.

[pbreit]

I coud see how her work is extremely satisfying and provides her with plenty of rich stimulation. It's not like she's a sole proprietor.

[baq]

for some there is, for some there isn't. i agree but i can totally understand that there are poeple who live to work.