If you don’t want to do the work of reading this, do the work of listening to an audio recording:
“I’m doing the work,” says every hipster Millennial from Brooklyn, San Francisco and Venice Beach inside of their head just after swallowing the last pasty, biting, putrid sip from the small wooden cup of ayahuasca served by a shaman who was born in Connecticut to two investment bankers and founded the wellness retreat that these Millennials have spent $6,800 to attend, which includes 5 hero doses of pureed tree bark, 10 days of sleeping on a cot in a communal tent, eating rice and a mushy yellow vegetable three times a day, and being entirely ignored by unqualified staff in the name of introspection. I’m really doing the work, they all think to themselves as the first wave of nausea attacks their GI system shortly before the hallucinations begin.
Doing the work is what younger people — who live in coastal cities and upscale mountain towns and subsist on modest trust funds provided by confused, remorseful parents — do in lieu of working. It is not possible to do the work while having a traditional job, because doing the work is basically a full-time pursuit. #doingthework is universally understood to be the pathway to #healing, which leads to #gratitude, which ultimately makes it possible for someone to be #blessed. Once someone is #blessed, it is no longer necessary to work, because #abundance is naturally occurring for these people (even though their parents probably didn’t do drugs and party for 7 years and suddenly find themselves with a 5,000 square foot house on a cul-de-sac in Westchester, a live-in housekeeper, and two BMWs).
Doing the work (DTW) in the past decade has evolved from studying diligently in school, working with a therapist, going to the gym, reading a lot of books, and practicing a meaningful skill with focus and commitment into buying a Theragun and a pre-weathered leather gratitude journal, with very thick, coarse paper and a suede leather privacy tie, and leaving both on one’s bedside table so that prospective sex partners can see that the person they’re about to sleep with is indeed DTW, which negates the need for condoms.
A significant component of DTW is talking about DTW, because there is no upside to DTW unless every knows that you are DTW. A conversation about DTW might progress as follows:
“What’s up, man?” asks a normally dressed person, who probably works in real estate private equity (let’s call him Chad), of another person who, based on his (or their) open kimono, manbun (or nonbinarybun), and sixty or so bracelets, is probably eager to talk about DTW and is named Leaf. “It’s been a while,” says Chad.
Leaf is on his way out of Do Not Feed Alligators holding a matcha in a ceramic mug he brought from his suspiciously large Soho loft, and Chad is on his way into the café for his fourth double espresso of the day.
“I’m doing the work,” says Leaf with a weary smile, lowering and slowly nodding his head, feigning humility and fatigue. He takes a sip of matcha.
“What exactly does that mean?” asks Chad with a flush of irritation. Chad looks past Leaf at the line in the cafe.
“Ah, you’d only know if you were doing the work,” responds this doer of work with an even wearier, wiser smile as he places his un-matcha’d hand onto Chad’s unhealed, ungrateful, unblessed shoulder, which is covered in bro-core clothing, like Scotch & Soda, Faherty, and Marine Layer, for example.
“But like, what fucking kind work are you doing?” asks Chad more sharply, unable to contain his annoyance. “I’ve know you since we pledged SAE together freshman year at Trinity. You were a beast of a lax attackman, you double majored in econ and poli sci, you fucking destroyed it for three years at Goldman, and now all I see you do is take drugs at parties and post moody photos of trees, ceramic shit in Uruguay and, like, people in pajamas laying on indigenous rugs in Upstate houses. How the fuck is that actual work?” Leaf looks at his old, square, closed-off friend with severely blocked chakras and short, showered, corporate hair, and slowly shakes his head.
“I think you need to do the work,” he says, looking deeply into Chad’s chaddy eyes, and then takes a very long, deep breath in through his nose-ringed nose and exhales loudly out of his mouth, which is bordered by exactly 11 days of stubble.
“What the fuck is that noise you’re making?” asks Chad chaddily as he shrugs off the hand of his estranged friend, who changed his name from Brent after living for 6 months in Belize.
“That is my Ujjayi breath, which helps me conjure compassion for those who have not done the work,” Leaf says as he adjusts his genderqueerbun.
“You know, bro, I think you need to cool it with that psycho shit you drank in Peru-”
“Medicine,” corrects Leaf.
“-and stop going to those rug-hug cuddle puddle orgies-”
“Ceremonies,” corrects Leaf.
“-and get the fuck out of that weirdo cult-”
“Community,” corrects Leaf.
“-that you’re in, because none of those people have any kind of future,” says Chad. “They’re aimless degenerates, and suddenly you’re one of them.”
“You don’t see me, Chad,” says Leaf, “because you aren’t ready to do the work.”
“Bro, I see you, and I smell you,” says Chad. “Maybe take a shower and then let’s talk about work. My dad could probably get you into JPM as a second year on the fixed income desk, and then after a year or two you could get an MBA at NYU or maybe even Penn and work your way onto the buy side-”
“-I’ve already explored my bi side,” interrupts Leaf.
“-but you’d seriously need to clean yourself up.” Chad looks at his Garmin watch. “I gotta get back to work.” Chad slaps Leaf on the shoulder and walks past him into Do Not Feed Alligators. Leaf closes his eyes and smiles, knowing Chad is only going back to toil, not work.
As you can see from this example, DTW is hard and requires a great deal of sacrifice and investment. You will need to:
find a very attractive kundalini yoga practitioner who will work with you very, very privately
donate (or de-button) all of your shirts that have functional buttons
acquire bracelets from a minimum of five emerging countries, and at least two of them must require visas
renounce alcohol in favor of California sobriety
stop trimming your chest hair (if you are a chest hair having person), and stop wearing a bra (if you are a breast having person)
stop using any kind of deodorant that works, advocate against tap water, and say that you are going to vote for a third party candidate but not actually vote, because November is when you’ll be on your vipassana
get a personalized mantra from a wise brown person, and repeat it to yourself for the 2 minutes of your 20-minute daily meditation that you don’t spend thinking about what you’re having for breakfast, even though you’re going to fast until dinner, except for your collagen protein smoothie
tell people that you are vegan, but eat grassfed steak on the DL to maintain the muscle mass you built before you stopped lifting weights because gyms aren’t the right frequency now that you’re DTW
do a lot of weird stretches in public and especially at floor parties
renounce any trace of self-awareness, which is easier if you kill your ego with a lot of acid
go to Burning Man, but tell everyone that this is your last Burn because no one really practices the 10 principles anymore
cease all form of remunerative work (except for coaching, which, despite it no longer being a thing, does not count as work, because it is a calling)
during every conversation longer than 4 minutes, paraphrase Alan Watts (because his quotes are too long to remember verbatim)
Read The Body Keeps the Score, because everyone you will meet now that you are DTW will have memorized it and sent it to their parents as a passive aggressive rebuke of their parenting skills
Listen to Matt McConaughey’s Greenlight, because he has definitely done the work of telling his image team to style him as someone who has DTW
Buy One Hundred Years of Solitude (but don’t read it, because it’s super confusing), Stillness Speaks, and Tao Te Ching, and leave them on your bedside table next to your gratitude journal and Theragun
Post on IG a close-up portrait of yourself on the beach or on a mountain at dawn on the East Coast or sunset on the West Coast with the caption, “I’m Sorry, Please Forgive Me, Thank You, I Love You.”
Congratulations. You are now someone who has DTW. Good luck getting back onto the buy side.
Thanks to Carla for planting the seed.
I’m praying neither of my kids names one of my grandchildren Leaf or Petal.
I was never not laughing. You really DTW with this one