thankful for a flexible work schedule / post updated

I am really really really thankful for a flexible work schedule. That is TRUTH. For the sales industry I work in (marketplace, which is far more reaching than my specific job), my personal work schedule is exceptionally flexible.  I work in a marketplace environment that quite literally works 7 days a week; and where being successful means being on call all the time, everyday (even during family emergencies, illnesses, vacations, etc). {I am sure small business owners can attest to this sort of thing.} There is never a time when the business isn't required to take priority over everything else. Plus if people in this type of marketplace are dedicated and faithfully serving in Ministry; work and ministry become the primary two things that overwhelmingly pull on the resources of time, energy, and money. In order for them to succeed at putting first things first (God, family, personal health), they must have STRONG boundaries and be highly skilled at creative solutions and flexible creative scheduling, and have THICK skin (be confident in who they are and what they are doing, mostly unaffected by other people's opinions). I am impressed by these types of people. But I don't aspire to be them. I don't have that kind of grit. So yes, I am very very thankful for my flexible work schedule. I don't work 7 days a week. I sometimes don't answer my phone or my email immediately so that I can spend a few hours in quiet, or with family or friends. I go on vacations to places where the cell signal is weak and there is little to no internet. This can be an irritant to those that I work with and for, because it is counter to the marketplace culture of the sales industry I work in. I am grateful for their patience and thankful that, so far, I am allowed the privilege and leniency of a flexible work schedule. I don't take it for granted, even when workflow demands pull hard on MY resources too.


I know my inner frustration with my own inabilities to keep up with the rest of my marketplace counterparts is coming through in this post.  Sorry ... I am just writing this to process this.  I'm good.  I'm okay.  And it is truth that I am grateful for my flexible work schedule.  Brian wouldn't have been able to visit without it.

April 1, 2017