“Do you miss working?”

It’s been four months since I sold my last business. During that time, my blood pressure has dropped from an average of 130/85 to 110/65. My weight has also dropped fifteen pounds -- with little change in eating or exercise. I have hope that I’ll soon fit into the dresses in storage bins marked an accusatory “too small.” As if it was somehow their fault that my waist had disappeared over the years, causing them to become too tight.

Alarmingly, I’m out of debt. In 1966, I learned about “credit.” I eventually ran up a monstrous $3 million of debt in the early 1990s.

It’s taken all of the last four months to absorb the simple fact that other than a collapse of the national economy I will easily have all the money needed to satisfy my needs. . .for the rest of my life.

I still maintain a “to do” list like I did every day in business. The difference being that almost nothing on the list is timely. For the last three decades, I had to prioritize which dumpster fires I would attempt to extinguish.

Yet, the simple truth is, “Yes, there are things about work I do miss.”

It’s not a lack of purpose in my life that leaves me feeling incomplete. “Purpose” would suggest a linear path in my business struggles. When you work with thousands of individuals and dozens of major corporations the watchword is “whimsy.” Whimsy easily trumps logic in the corporate world . . . and individuals can be quite imaginative in their mayhem. To be successful I had to be an artful dodger rather than an insistent locomotive. I'd lost true "purpose” years ago.

To fully appreciate what I miss about working, you need to accept the depths of my shallowness.

I lived in a world where the color of a piece of cloth draped around your neck signaled your resolve. Smiles were a tool used to disarm your opponent. Friendships were totally transactional. It was during the last third of my six-decade career that what I did was defined. I became known as a “disrupter” and then as an “influencer.”

As an “influencer” people eagerly sought my favor. I was wined and dined and showered with awards, free trips, watches, and cash prizes of as much as $25,000 – for simply doing my job.

But the “aphrodisiac constant” – the straw that stirred my influencer smoothie – was PRAISE.

The minute I accepted a Publishers’ Clearinghouse-sized check for my business, people quit telling me how wonderful I am.

One of my basic business tenets was to always motivate and never manipulate. To abide by my self-imposed rule, I judged my actions against a high standard of truthiness. If a person is willing to lie, they’re probably very willing to manipulate you.

I had suspected that the highly favorable opinions expressed during business meetings over English muffins and orange juice weren’t unadulterated. However, I was totally unprepared for the ego-massage to end.

My weeks usually involved seven to ten meetings during which two to five people would vie to stroke my vanity. Those engaged in this corporate fellatio often had C-level titles. Whatever their corporate roles the false platitudes rolled off their lips, “Kudos…kudos…kudos!”

It was all a façade.

The sooner I accept that and “move on” – the less I will miss it.

My dog thinks I’m fantastic, which will have to be enough.

Jill