How Not to Find Meaning
What prevents us from believing that meaningful work is possible for us? Why might we think that career fulfillment exists for others, but remains out of reach for ourselves? What takes the wind out of our sails?
Often, we cite "pragmatism" and the need to "just get a job and figure it out from there" as the reason the wind dies down around us. And like good sailors, rather than blame the wind for our lack of progress, we adjust our sails and take any job. But in doing so, we must be careful not to confuse and compound the issue at hand lest we seek the dead-ends of career satisfaction.
In our efforts to appeal to both our heart and our head, we often look to three unsatisfying gap-fillers to try and satiate our need for good work. Each promises to bridge the divide between our current reality and the meaningful work we crave. Each ultimately fails.
Gap Filler 1: Company Loyalty and Promise
Let's start by acknowledging what may be obvious: it’s a good thing to work and make money for a company. Furthermore, the drive for a company’s profit is largely intertwined with a craftsman’s own pragmatic needs and aspirations. In fact, this partnership between worker and organization can flourish if the organization uses that output well and treats the craftsman with respect and value.
In cases like these, the craftsman’s work serves good ends like a balanced, three-legged stool:
Their work is exchanged for a fair wage
They have ample opportunity to do their job well and grow
Their work serves good, far-reaching purposes (accomplishing more than they could do merely as an individual)
A good company can be a boon to the craftsman. As experience builds upon experience, higher levels of positional power can rise parallel to higher levels of career satisfaction, and increase one’s impact. In such an environment, the craftsman’s heart rarely questions the ends of their work.
When the Finish Tarnishes
But what often happens over time is a tarnishing of the role. The flaws and cracks begin to show, and like a cheap finish on a table, the craftsman’s outlook on the organization, the people around them, and the work they're doing begins to degrade, revealing the bare, raw wood beneath.
It can seem that what you were sold in the interview—a fun culture, charitable opportunities, a focus on human connection—was merely window dressing for the reality of the situation: when you raise concerns or set off to bring these things to fruition, you're turned away with a cursory pat on the head and directed back toward things that drive mere profit.
The rationale from the higher-ups is: none of those idealistic, human-centered goals are possible without the company's profit, so we should focus there first. But "focusing there first" usually means "focusing there only." In this, the craftsman loses faith that their organization is stewarding their work well.
Skills Without Purpose
As for the craftsman's opportunities to do their job well and grow? In scenarios like this, their role in the company often becomes little more than a cog in the profit machine executing a bland, repeatable process- all done while navigating senseless interdepartmental politics, policies sprung out of nowhere, and micro-managing bosses. This minutiae only serves to widen the gap between daily tasks and the "mission" displayed on a boardroom wall.
As the craftsman sees the only remaining leg of the stool is a "fair exchange" for wages, their heart begins to grey. The symptoms are familiar:
The Sunday night blues kick in at 3pm... on Saturday
They start thinking, "Two more hours, until there's only three more hours left in the day"
It's May 15th, and they only have 3 days of PTO left
Someone asks how the weekend was, and the cringe reply escapes: "Not long enough!"
They're late coming back from lunch because they were job searching and trying to fire off one more application
The company is an unreliable gap-filler because while mere profit keeps the lights on in the house, it comes at the cost of dimming the light in our hearts. Mere profitability does not—cannot—feed the soul of a craftsman.
This is where many start their journey of disillusionment. It's the realization that not only is this company a bane to aligning tasks and talents, but the bridge toward a place of satisfaction is nowhere to be found. It’s when a craftsman reaches this conclusion, they usually reach for the next gap-filler:
Gap Filler 2: Numbing Out
When the disillusionment of work or the disillusionment with an organization hits, "Numbing Out" becomes the easiest path to protect a disappointed heart. The low-energy craftsman will drift towards “quiet quitting”, and the high-energy craftsman will drift towards a twisted form of stoicism.
False Stoicism
The thinking goes like this: "No, I'm not experiencing disappointment, I just haven't fully embraced Stoicism. See, if I am simply persistent, and do as I’m told, I can have an OK existence. I'll let go of believing that my effort will be meaningfully rewarded. If my boss gives me goals for the year, I may hit them, and I may receive that 3% merit bonus. If I join another subcommittee, It’ll probably be on the shortlist when a position opens up (regardless of our actual skill), and then things will get better."
But this is not a healthy kind of disengagement, and it's not Stoicism. The pure Stoic craftsman would seek long-lasting joy (as distinct from momentary "pleasure") through mastery of self-control and contribution. The line of thinking above betrays this notion by making joy contingent upon the reward gained. In fact, this thought process is more akin to diverting the eyes away from fear (an aim of a Stoic)—fear that work is not joyful, and fear that work may never be joyful.
Quiet Quitting
Doing the minimum required to keep your job (recently known as “Quiet Quitting”) falls squarely into the numbing out category, though it's often presented as a form of boundary-setting or work-life reclamation. While there's nothing inherently dishonest about exchanging appropriate effort for a contractual wage, for those aspiring to be career craftsmen, it's problematic in the same way caffeine is for a toddler—it stunts growth. A quiet-quitting attitude gradually drains creative energy and initiative, preventing the craftsman from honing their talents and/or developing mastery. It creates a comfortable but stagnant holding pattern that does nothing to position them for the next step in the career journey. The craftsman doesn't grow through minimal engagement, just as muscles don't strengthen without resistance. By deliberately limiting your investment in the work itself, they inadvertently limit their development as well.
No matter which path of “numbing out” is chosen, they are both dead-ends. Were they to be executed perfectly, the craftsman might dull the pain of an unfulfilling job, and they definitely won't feel the satisfaction of a job well done. Instead, they’ll have planted themselves firmly in the mud between the wondrous possibilities of the ocean and the dryness of the desert. The natural conclusion: if I can't trust an organization to have the best intentions for me, and I can’t trust my apathy to shield me from it, then I'm going to have to rely on my own effort to make my destiny. This leads to the third gap-filler.
Gap Filler 3: Hustle Culture
The prevailing cure-all of the age. There's no shortage of influencers and books that will say when a heart has lost faith in their organization and seen “numbing out” for the half-measure it is, it's time to shrug it all off and take matters into your own hands. The prescription is familiar: dig in, work twice as hard, and subscribe to a seven-part series where you can learn the secrets of a career in crypto to have a Ferrari in your garage by Tuesday. All it will take is maximum commitment and self-discipline.
Our capacity to Hustle
Hustle culture's most fundamental flaw lies in assuming that something so vital to our soul—meaningful work—can be manufactured through sheer force of will. But this is a paradox: something so essential to our being cannot be found solely within ourselves, just as a character in a book cannot fully analyze themselves without the author's perspective. We are limited beings with blind spots and contradictions. Secondly, our own hearts often lead us astray from our well-being—I know nachos will wreak havoc on my digestive system, yet there I am at 9 PM on game day, enthusiastically devouring a plate, already anticipating (but dismissing) tomorrow's discomfort. If I can't trust myself to make the right choice about something as simple as food, how can I trust that my own hustle, my own ambition, and my own discernment alone will lead me to meaningful work?
The Treadmill of Shame
Another reason: maximum commitment and control is a false idol that puts you on a treadmill of shame. The internal voice that promises the secret to success viciously turns to a demanding critic:
Oh, you had a sick day? You could've saved that day off and worked on your side-hustle.
You wanted to get coffee with a friend? That's $8 less you can spend on your marketing fund.
Your numbers aren't increasing like they should? It's clearly something you should've calculated for.
The fact that you don't have a backup plan is another reason why you're weak and are in this situation in the first place.
You hit an income goal? Good, now that's over. Get back to hitting the next one.
Thankfully, "hustle culture" appears to be on the decline as workers around the world embrace self-care, whether through "break culture" or recognizing the workplace as an empty source for complete satisfaction. Hustle culture's self-reliance is not just exhausting; it's fundamentally misguided about human nature itself.
Beyond the Gap Fillers
Maybe you resonate with one (or, God forbid, more) of these gap-fillers. Maybe you know firsthand the darkened color that comes into your world by trusting in any of these false ends. But regardless of your experience, the evidence is clear: we can't afford to use a cheap filler.
We must construct a lasting bridge.
That's not said lightly, because the paradox remains: we want to believe that the desire for meaningful work is good, we want to believe that it's vital to pursue. But if our search for appropriate career satisfaction can't be found in an organization, can't be found by stoic disengagement, and can't be found in ourselves through exaggerated self-discipline, what's left?
Ironically, we turn to the work itself.
And here we find the ethos of craftsmanship.
The craftsman understands that meaning isn't found primarily in the organization, in detachment, or in hustling harder—it's found in the relationship between the worker and the work. It's in the approach, the care, the cultivation of skill, and the pride in quality that transcends external validation or reward.
This ethos offers us a fourth way—not a gap-filler, but a bridge built on solid foundations. It doesn't promise escape from all workplace frustrations or guarantee perfect alignment with every organization. Instead, it offers something more sustainable: the ability to find meaning in the work itself, regardless of circumstance.
Are you ready to move beyond these inadequate gap-fillers toward a more sustainable relationship with your work? Have you experienced the disappointment of these false promises and are seeking a more authentic approach to career fulfillment?
Read our ebook: Career-Craft: Recover Purpose in Work through the Ethos of Craft. It provides a detailed roadmap for developing a relationship with work that doesn't depend on unreliable external factors. With practical tools and frameworks, it helps you build a foundation for lasting career fulfillment based on the timeless principles of craftsmanship.