Bare-arsed Zooming on a beach: WFH or WTF?
Or how 'creating your life' is a very reasonable idea. (But I'll take a cushy chair and a blanket, thanks.)
The concept of crafting a better, bespoke version of your life is joyous, energising and exciting I think; while simultaneously seeming ridiculous, overwhelming and terrifying. It comes loaded with all sorts of baggage, too: it’s self-indulgent, selfish and unrealistic; an idea suited only to those who don’t live in the real world – hippies, artists, spiritual seekers, indulgent elites. But why does the idea of consciously making your life as good as possible seem unreasonable? And what does it look like in the real world?
Since I’ve framed these questions, examples have popped up everywhere, in that way they do: you learn a new word and it appears on every second page; you’re pregnant and notice firm, round bellies on every street. But these examples are exotic rather than the real-world type I’m looking for.
While listening to an interview I did with Beau Miles – filmmaker, writer, academic, adventurer, oddball – for an upcoming profile in Wild magazine, I noticed how he talked about happiness. He doesn’t rate it; instead his aim is to be happily challenged. These happy challenges can be shared or solo, and range from the whimsical to the out there – walking the 90 kilometres to work, on purpose; eating his bodyweight in beans; running a mile an hour for a full day, getting stuff done on the side – but are things he picks and works at and adapts as he goes. He’s crafting his life.
Hanging out the washing on Monday, listening to the wonderful ‘On Being’ podcast, the lilting Irish voice of poet and philosopher John O’Donohue sang into my ears. ‘Everyone is involved, whether they like it or not, in the construction of their world. So it’s never as given as it actually looks; you’re always shaping it and building it. And I feel that from that perspective, each of us is an artist.’ (See more below about this amazing interview.)
Now the lives of Beau (aka the backyard adventurer) and ex-priest John are not ‘ordinary’, real-world examples. But they are the result of decades of cumulative choices and actions.
In his book The Lion Tracker’s Guide to Life, Boyd Varty (a wilderness tracker and life coach – another great, real-world example!) compares decisions in life to those made on the trail. ‘Any choice will set something in motion. This is the magic of the bush and life. You use your intention, take action, and let go. The bush teaches us that the lesson is more about discovery than being correct. On the trail there is not one way; the only mistake is to not make any choice. As it is in life.’
I think the reason the idea of ‘crafting your life’ can seem so out of reach is that the examples we celebrate are like the three above: they showcase people who’ve spent decades following their own paths, until their lives seem far removed from the norm. Which they are now, but only as the result of thousands of small, conscious actions over decades.
Taking the same approach will necessarily bring change. Not in big, flashy, difficult ways, but in ways that feel good, that bring joy and purpose and meaning.
Let’s take it back to the second question: what does crafting your life look like in the real world? Below is one example, of a stranger I ran into on a beach, who used the post-Covid work-from-home flexibility to do things a little bit differently. Rather than a boring old house, he chose to work from the beach, and his standard business attire ended at the waist.
On including pockets of freedom and joy (and perhaps nudity) in your workday
If you want to enjoy working bare-arsed on a beach in winter, a few things are required: a fully-charged laptop (for both warmth and power); a spot that’s sheltered from the wind, bathed in warm sun and protected from the public; and preferably a good view. In 2020, Covid brought about huge increases in workplace flexibility as well as the horrors of home schooling, making it easier both to work in the buff and get busted by small children.
The story begins on one of those winter mornings that make Sydneysiders smug: warm and sparkly, with white sand and blue water highlighted with fresh, fluffy foam. Even the ferry crossing the harbour toward Manly seemed freshly painted in patriotic green and gold. My son and I had gone for a walk, ending in a scramble down steep cliffs to Washaway Beach.
This beach is known as Sydney Harbour’s most secluded, and there were only a couple of people there. My five-year-old dashed for the wide rock platforms, dotted with pools, showered by spray. After an hour or so spent investigating shells, strange red starfish and the contents of the snack box, we turned back. Rounding a boulder, we almost stepped on a man leaning against the rough rock. He had his laptop out, headphones in, and was surely overusing the word ‘pivot’ – so far, so very 2020. Except this guy wasn’t wearing any pants. Not in the usual working-from-home interpretation – I don’t mean business shirt and trackies – but in a more literal sense.
I carefully steered Max around our nudie friend, keen to project how completely fine I was with exposed genitalia while also preventing my son from asking, ‘Why has he got his willy out?’ very loudly. And then I looked ahead to see a bare bum disappearing around the next corner, and a couple of uninterruptedly brown bodies on the sand. We navigated the undressed with minimal questions, although our investigative amble sped up a bit. It turns out that our family’s new favourite beach was one of Sydney’s many naturalist haunts.
I’ve been to a number of nudist patches, been nervous among large Germans in Europe, as well as men wearing only hats who chose the patch of sand next to mine on huge, empty South Coast beaches. But pants-off typing while balanced on the rocky edge of Sydney Harbour: WTF kind of WFH is that?
Lots has been written about the pandemic’s relaxation of work rules. About how high heels are dead, flexibility is here to stay, less commuting will reduce the need for more roads. Then there’s the softer stuff: how the work/life juggle has become more visible and acknowledged due to the shit fight of combining home schooling with working from home. I can see it at our place: my husband’s colleagues greet our kids by name, admire their artwork and gracefully ignore echoing tantrums.
I’ve been working from home for more than a decade, and the most interesting thing about the whole forced experiment is seeing other people’s interpretation of what it could be. These newbies have turned my interpretation of WFH – balancing work calls with house cleaning, listening to seminars while pegging out washing, looking longingly at the sunshine out the window but staying at my desk – into something that looks remarkably free.
The waters off Manly are dotted with swimmers and surfers now able to cram midweek magic into the middle of winter. People walk the bush tracks while in meetings, soaking in views, sunshine and fitness. Others make space to bike, garden, cook, kayak. Dressing up has been replaced by Ugg boots and lap blankets; business lunches by shared sandwiches in the sun.
There are benefits to working both from home and an office: workplaces provide social connections, easy interaction and more support; working from home allows more control and freedom, less structure and commuting. What the last few years has offered is an alternative vision of what work can be, an opportunity to consciously craft your circumstances, including things that make life better. Whether that’s fitting in a swim or working sans culottes is up to you.
The beautiful art of great conversation
I recently found the ‘On Being’ podcast, a series of conversations with thinkers and artists and scientists and more, all about what it means to be human and how we want to live. There are hundreds of gentle but deep and illuminating interviews, but my favourite so far is the one with John Donohue about beauty (mentioned above). In it he talks about ways of encouraging beauty, one of them being great conversation.
‘When is the last time that you had a great conversation…in which you overheard yourself saying things that you never knew you knew, that you heard yourself receiving from somebody words that absolutely found places within you that you’d thought you had lost, and a sense of an event of a conversation that brought the two of you onto a different plane, and then continued to sing in your mind for weeks afterwards? I’ve had some of them recently, and it’s just absolutely amazing. They’re food and drink for the soul.’
You’ve got to set the bar somewhere, may as well aim high. No more chats - it’s time for great conversations…
The Women’s World Cup: amazing sportswomen, and men with flaming pants
I loved this article by Annabel Crabb talking about gender balance and merit, using the Women’s World Cup as an example. She describes the tournament as, ‘several weeks of sustained and glorious high performance by a fleet of underpaid women, from whom our rapt gaze was periodically distracted only by a series of less gifted dudes setting their own silly arses on fire.’ And then she goes on to articulate the whole schmozzle so brilliantly you get angry and laugh at the same time.