Be it money, power or possession; when is enough, actually enough?

Having sat fairly stagnant in a job role for 5-plus years, it’s recently become apparent to me of a need to ‘move on’ or perhaps more importantly, ‘move up’. ‘Up’ being vertically up the hierarchy in order to take on more responsibility and power armed with the experience I’ve gathered. But why would I actually want to move up?

Up would bring with it additional responsibilities, the tasking of which would be financially remunerated. The money is actually less about the additional responsibility placed upon the elevated position, and more the additional time that would be required to complete the relevant tasks. So, how do you actually put a price on that time?

I once turned down a job promotion at a new company because of the length of commute. It looked manageable on paper, but actually making that journey twice during the interview day showed that even on a good day with regards to traffic, it wasn’t time that I was willing to ‘waste’. The money being offered wasn’t worth the additional hour-and-a-half of idle time. But what if the money had been greater? May that have made me think twice?

So if it’s not money, it must be power. The power that appears to come with elevated job roles. Be it for self-satisfaction of making it to a certain level or being able to allow others to benefit from your experience, or from the ability to demonstrate to others that you’ve ‘made it’ by achieving a certain level of the hierarchy; power means something. You either use your power to empower others, or to oppress those same people. A sustainable society has the ability to empower others to become as good, if not better, than those currently in power. But how often does this theory become practice?

All of that aside, is there anything really wrong with staying where you are and being contented? My current role is not one that requires a huge amount of thought given the experience that I have accrued, nor does it require a substantial amount of time to complete outside of the regular working day. But there’s an itch that needs to be scratched, and if I’m honest it’s more to do with money that anything else. Money that can help get a larger mortgage in order to buy a bigger house which is becoming a necessity with regards to how life is panning out.

The end result is that we are slaves to the power of money. We need it to achieve what we believe to be an acceptable quality of life. If it takes more effort and time, then that simply will need to be the trade-off.