The author (not pictured) works remotely and has a four-day workweek, which allows him to spend more time with his family.
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When my wife and I moved from Calgary to Nelson, British Columbia, in 2017, we were mostly thinking about our kids. We wanted them to have space, freedom, and a childhood spent outdoors in nature rather than in a car seat during rush hour.What I didn't think much about, though, was what the move would do to my career.After we moved, I was fortunate enough to keep my corporate job and go fully remote. Over the years that followed, I made a series of choices that, from the outside, probably look like a career stalling out. Instead of working long hours in an office in a downtown high-rise, I work four days a week from our spare bedroom in a small town of 11,000 people. And I've turned down multiple opportunities to step into a lead role within my company.None of that happened by accident. Every part of it was deliberate, and I'd make the same choices again. But I've learned that when you opt out of the ladder on purpose, the people around you struggle to read it as a decision. They read it as a problem.People assume I'm waiting for something betterColleagues, friends, and family members will often ask me how the four-day thing is "working out," in the same tone you'd use to ask about a medical treatment. Nobody has ever said "you're wasting your potential" out loud, but the assumption is right there underneath the conversation: that I'm stuck in a holding pattern, that this is temporary, that eventually I'll get serious about my career.The truth is, I already did get serious. I just got serious about something else.I take Fridays off to homeschool and spend time with my kids. I get to drop off and pick them up from school. I coach their soccer teams. And I've built a second career as a freelance writer that exists entirely in the hours a promotion would have taken.
