I have a wonderful friend who studied Art History with me. She worked as a successful accountant before becoming a practicing artist. Apart from her endlessly interesting stories about strapping her artworks down in bakkies (the South African term for a pick-up truck) and clinging on for dear life through the streets of Johannesburg, she frequently mentions how lucky she is to have her husband. When I ask what the secret to this kind of love-filled marriage is, she says there isn’t one. She always tells me that an enduring, successful relationship is one of compromise, curiosity, gratitude and hard work. It takes honesty, communication and perseverance to make a relationship thrive.

Thinking about it, having a job is very similar to maintaining a relationship.

Nothing in what I’ve written here applies to a relationship or a job where your physical, mental, or emotional wellbeing are being threatened. In the workplace, burn-out is genuine and insidious, and can happen when you’re bored by an unchallenging job just as much as when you’re working too hard. Hustle culture and the praise of busywork instead of actual progress persists. Racial, gender- and sexuality-based micro-aggressions continue. I’m arguing for the good-enough job, where you are safe, able to learn new skills, and have your work recognised for directly contributing to the company’s success.

In 2021, 47 million people left their jobs in the United States, citing a lack of benefits, flexibility and empathy from their employers during the challenges of the pandemic. The Great Resignation includes people leaving jobs to pursue their passions and have a sustainable work/life balance. But what some employees are finding is that their new roles are just as tedious and run-of-the-mill as their previous jobs. Below are three factors to consider when scrolling through LinkedIn Jobs looking for your ‘dream job’.

You’re being paid to do something that someone else has neither the capacity or inclination to do. Be realistic about the nature of exchanging your time and labor for money, which may enable you to pursue your true passions without the strain of needing to make money from them. Be practical about resigning and finding something new; the grass may be exactly the same middling green colour on the other side. Honestly, the grass may be greener where you water it, as my colleague often reminds me.

I’ll stop with the lawn metaphors, but perhaps if you looked up and saw the millions of people often quite literally scraping a living from bare earth, the voices of discontent would hush a little.

South Africa, where I live, has recently been bestowed the shameful title of most unequal country in the world, demonstrated by the country’s Youth Unemployment Rate of an appalling 66%. It is thus sharply humbling to list the things I am grateful for, because I can count a basic education and a small amount of savings among the things I have that many people don’t.

I am so lucky to have landed my job at Syft Analytics in the middle of a pandemic, the likes of which the world hasn’t seen for 100 years. I am incredibly grateful for my position which gives me a safe, supportive, exciting work environment. I am so thankful for the first year of working for this company, where I felt the challenges of my role became a crucible for me to emerge from with courage and confidence.

Even though it really felt like I was being heartily simmered in the Syft pot at some points, I forced myself to confront the story I was telling myself about working life.

This is a hard pill to swallow, but is it you? If you’re complaining that your job is dull, unrelated to your qualifications, or crawling with witless colleagues, here are some inward-looking solutions:

"My job is boring."

Find ways to make meaning in your current job. Take control of your professional development, and be assertive about the ways in which you want to make an impact at work. The chances of success are infinitely higher if you frame a new idea as beneficial to the company. Be prepared with quantifiable metrics to show how this project will increase income and save time. There are brilliant guidelines out there, like this article from The Muse, to help you get what you want by showing how it’ll help the company, and make it easy for your manager to support you.

“This is not what I trained to do”.

Okay, but what are you learning? I trained in museum studies and worked for 9 months alone in a freezing museum cataloging rat skulls. Was the job technically in my field? Yes. Did I learn anything? Not really. Instead of meandering down a path your university degree set out for you, have the courage to suck at something new. Learning grit, resilience, and persistence might stand you in greater stead down the line.

“My colleagues infuriate me”.

This anger is potentially linked to a lack of boundaries. I know these hard conversations make your skin crawl, but if your co-workers are annoying because they keep telling you long, inane stories about their personal lives, for instance, you need to tell them to go away in a professional, respectful way. Nedra Glover Tawab’s book Set Boundaries, Find Peace is an empowering place to start. I know very well the feeling of wanting to fall through a chasm in the floor rather than talk to that one coworker, but don’t delude yourself into thinking there won’t be difficult coworkers in your next job. Try to be curious about the inner worlds of your colleagues. They might be less insufferable if you learn they also have strong feelings about the ending of Bridgerton Season 2 on Netflix.

So sure, maybe another job would give you a shorter commute time, or more flexible work hours. Absolutely, if you’ve done all the things I’ve mentioned and still have a bovine boss who refuses to listen to a single well-conceptualised idea, your colleagues are all selfish troglodytes who eat brussels sprouts in the open-plan office, and you’re too burnt out to practice your hobbies, move on. If clear expectations and deliverables have been agreed upon and produced, and you are then made to feel pressured or guilty for wanting a good work-life balance, move on. If you are being threatened or harassed, not being compensated fairly, or are genuinely not able to learn anything from your role, move on.

However, much like relationships, maybe it is actually you, not them. If you haven’t been honest, persistent and proactive in your current job, you may find yourself saying the very same thing in your new role in 6 months’ time.