For as long as I can remember, I’ve been drawn to people who care deeply about what they do. That’s been one of my identifiers for quality people: do you feel something for your work? Do you care enough to want it to matter? Because doing meaningful work requires you to care. Whether you’re launching a product to make life easier, teaching in a classroom, or writing research to inform policy, you have to believe that what you’re doing holds value—that it can lead to something better. And caring people value themselves and others…
But lately, caring feels like a curse. Maybe it always has been, but it’s worse now. Feeling has become heavy. Only those good at compartmentalising (I truly envy you) can stay sane. Because the more conscious you are, the more you notice how little your work seems to matter. How do you keep showing up when everything feels like it’s falling apart? How do you teach justice when injustice is the norm? How do you keep researching when those in power have no intention of using that knowledge?
And so my belief that work should be meaningful, which has fueled my career and life, is at this moment also what’s breaking my heart. And bringing me to the brink of a depressive episode.
Why am I sharing this here? Well, LinkedIn used to be a space that showcases passion for ones [meaningful] work not just the wins as it seems now. Here we could see insights and growth. But scrolling now, I find that even the shiniest updates carry exhaustion. Beneath the achievements, there’s a quiet despair: our work is losing its meaning.
As someone who works on education and social justice for development, I’m increasingly haunted by how disconnected knowledge is from action. We’ve theorized inequality to death. But even the little effort towards implementation we were making (remember all those equity and inclusion statements?) is being undone less than five years later. Because funding. Because politics. Because profit.
So I ask: what’s the point of knowledge if those in power won’t use it? If it doesn’t make them money, or if they just don’t care?
And this isn’t just academia. Every field, be it business, tech, health, the arts etc. is caught in a battle between purpose and performance, between meaning and metrics.
I recently read a paper [my first “just because” academic read in a long while] that asked: Is scholar-activism an oxymoron? The fact that this is even up for debate made me shake my head.
Shouldn’t scholarship always have been activism? Not necessarily in the marching sense, but in the pursuit of truth and justice? If not for impact, what’s the point of all this knowledge generation? Are all these citations, all these conferences for vibes?
Maybe.
Because clearly, we’ve drifted. We’re no longer doing meaningful work. We’re doing measured work. Ranked, rated, reduced. And that, to me, is the real crisis.
There’s so much knowledge that could change lives. But who will use it? More importantly, who will be held accountable for not using it?
So I’m writing this here because I’ve wondered about my own melancholy over work I chose and genuinely love. But it’s clearer now: as the work loses meaning, so does our vim. And that’s why I’m tired. Deeply, soulfully tired.
It’s not normal to witness crisis after crisis and be expected to show up as usual. It’s not normal, and that’s why we’re exhausted. Constantly.
I know saying this might not be the most “LinkedIn” thing to do; not here where we’re all high-achieving and always inspired LOL! But we owe ourselves honesty. I’m tired of talking about change and seeing nothing change.
What keeps me going is the faint hope that maybe- just maybe- what we do now will matter later. That someone, someday, might stumble upon our work and use it to shift something. Like how that Lizzo song started to trend years after it came out, finally making her famous, maybe the paper we write today might not go anywhere till someone who cares comes to power and uses it for policy tomorrow.
That hope… and, of course, the need for a paycheck, is why I keep showing up.
If you’re feeling the same- disillusioned, angry, heartbroken… know you’re not alone. I believe there’s quiet a number of us of us out here. We’re trying our best to still care. Even when it doesn’t make sense.
Especially then.
