Updated: 9/19/2019 - 10PM (Final / Most updated survey posted!)
This post kicks off a request for shared stories of the search for meaningful work and sustainable livelihood. Readers of all ages and occupations are invited to fill out our survey and consent form, as well as to sign up for an interview (currently held virtually via zoom, or at a library/public spot in the Atlanta area.) Stories gathered will evaluate participant satisfaction with the work they currently do, and inquire as to what makes work 'meaningful'--defined as being personally significant or purposeful to the world (or both. ) This will include gathering information on what 'personally significant or purposeful--meaningful--work' constitutes for each individual participant. Stories will also be compared intergenerationally across decades to determine patterns in career expectations of fulfillment, success, and economic sustainability have shifted over time. Data will be cross listed to determine the presence of patterns in career field, (dis/)satisfaction, and financial sustainability. Along with this is the aim to yield information on how paths to stability and fulfillment are changing over time, and how people are interpreting this experience.This data will be used in a larger scholar-activist inquiry into what a sustainable and practical 'fulfillment-based economy' might look like.
This study is intended to be one building block toward new ideas for social and economic transformations in the global societies we inhabit and walk through. Similarity and difference across working experiences and attempts to find meaning in work over the last half of a century—both for the ‘boomer’ generation and the younger generations set to take over economic organizing and political structuring next—can yield a wellspring of information for those of us who may want to do things differently—and better.
VOLUNTEER TO PARTAKE IN SURVEYS, INTERVIEW, OR FOCUS GROUP:
To volunteer to be a participant in the larger ethnographic research process—which involves a survey and interview, and which is held at local or virtual locations: please submit a message with your name, e-mail, consent form, and completed survey to info@conscious-world.net.
Informed consent forms must be signed by all interview and survey participants. This includes options on participation level, permission requirements to use data gained in research presentations/writings on the study that will be featured in The Research Corner of The Conscious World online magazine and e-book compilation publications/that will remain property of The Conscious World, and requests to potentially document interviews in audio-podcast or video-recorded sessions, which may be used with permission in their entirety or in approved edited fashion for feature releases. If a participant at any point revokes consent prior to publication, materials will not be used, and participants will have early access to features for review—though participants must respond within 3 business days of early access response or their earlier consent will be presumed valid.
As of 2019, all participation is voluntary-unpaid, but appreciated!