#recentreads
The bad news is I'm still looking for a job. The good news is I love my current job, and I'm still able to listen to books while I work. These are mostly four-star reads that I've read in April.
I chose a reread of one of my favorite High School required reading novels for #BookedInTime :China
April 2025 @Cuilin
so-soShe does a fine job of setting out her stall, that between the ages of 8 and 40 or so we're effectively hijacked by biology and culture and that midlife is an opportunity to become our true selves. However I found I don't subscribe to the myths about ageing that she assumes are universal, so it wasn't nearly the paradigm shift that was promised. And while she's good on excavating one's authentic dreams, the realising of them is more problematic.
pickThe main premise - if we want to be happy at work, we shouldn't pursue a passion but rather develop skills which make us a great asset for employers. The better we become at what we do, the more we love our job.
But I would've appreciated some info on how this applies to people wanting to change careers in their mid-life and how this relates to being forced to have several careers throughout our lives as we live longer than previous generations.
pickA beautiful book which helps you gain perspective on when to quit and when to stick
pickI can't remember how this book got on my radar, but overall I like it a lot. There's a lot here that resonates with my recent experiences working full-time after a long, long break then choosing to go back to part-time. I think I'm less prone to define myself by my work, but I'm not immune to our culture's take on the virtue of labor. I wish I had a better roadmap for influencing systemic change, but the book provides welcome validation.
Staying in an Air B&B in my hometown to visit friends and family, and just needed a moment for myself. 😮💨😌
Next up is nonfiction. I‘ve been a stay-at-home mom for a long time now and I need all the help I can get to rejoin the workforce 😮💨
so-so⭐️⭐️⭐️ Some interesting thoughts/ideas about keeping work in its place in the context of your life and identity, but a lot of the examples were of super high performers who burned themselves out so badly that they left or took extended sabbaticals, which seem like more extreme cases. I was hoping for more about how to achieve “good enough” job status without having to burn it all down.
pickThis is not a how-to book with quick and easy tips on how to reclaim one‘s life from work. Everyone‘s relationship to work is different, so the book presents a variety of stories that you may see yourself in. This isn‘t telling me personally much new, but it does present the information in a good way that I think will help people who haven‘t thought about work in this way before.
