I am back to work after 9 months of self discovery and career break. I have escaped the city! I am now an account manager at the cool digital agency. I wrote this in my first week at work.  

I ran with a commuter crowd this morning. And I am not sure how I feel about these frowned grey faces, this aimless race, these polished exteriors concealing the messed up insides. Or actually, I do know how I feel about them. Oh I know all to well.

There are more and more people in jeans, old converse trainers, mismatched and stretched knits in this crowd. Most of them are young, but increasingly there is older folk among them too. They look relaxed, even though they are heading to work. And I like that. The workplace is changing. These people are disrupting the grey industrial cog based machine. These people are the future.

I’ll choose an out-of-bed haired, red converse trainers wearing, slightly messy girl in a big stretched ironic jumper over a polished, designer wear suited, almost geometric guy with a leather satchel any day of the week…

And yet, I can’t stop thinking, how do I retain my freedom amidst this crazy clash of internal values vs the economic needs?

How do I retain the freedom to be at ease with myself and the world? Freedom to be at one with the universe. Freedom to be calm. Freedom to have this light of life and curiosity and excitement in my eyes. Freedom to have a smile on my face. Freedom to continue expressing myself and freedom to contribute and be creative and make a change…

Let me start again.

The freedom from confining, unifying dress code. Grey skinny jeans and supras, my soul needs you!! The freedom from stupid meaningless office politics. The freedom from rat race, from running faster and achieving nothing and running yourself into ground. The freedom to be creative. The freedom to be at one with the Universe. The freedom to be with my family. And location independence, the ultimate freedom and dream.

This is my freedom manifesto 🙂

Freedom = happiness. Those who love what they do, those who are free while they are working, must be among the happiest people on Earth.

Tomorrow is back to work. I have escaped but God knows what lies ahead. Still keeping happiness as my goal. Let’s see how it goes.