“Work is something you must do – not from you, but from the outside world. What is it that the outside world requires you to do – that given a choice, you would rather not. That is work.

Leisure is whatever it is you do simply and soly because you wish to do it. The concept of leisure is “as the great human you are, you have the opportunity to express from inside of you – whatever it is – you wish to do.

If what you wish to do is watch TV 30 hours a week – this is probably entertainment that is not developing your full capacities. That’s fine. “

Wes Cecil in his Lecture on Leisure, September 2012 . For a delightful lecture on leisure, watch

Richard Branson is a poster child for a man who does not have to work. I have met a few wealthy people who work for leisure, and they do not or would not even comprehend the life of the average employee who relies on a job to earn income.

That is because the key to leisure is the freedom to educate yourself, engage in activities and grow as a person not to increase you career and job prospects, but for no goals or reason except self-expression.

“The activity itself is the reward for the activity. Why do you write? Because you like to write. Why do you paint? Because you like to paint. Whatever you do, you do it for the sake of the action itself.”

When you educate yourself and grow as a person to achieve want you want to achieve and not to increase your job prospects – those activities are for leisure.

With this in mind it is worth reflecting about the expectations that are currently created by various influential “leaders” who work as leisure, and whose quotes about life and their success inspire employees around the world to “express themselves” and “work because it is their passion” and realization of their full potential.

The downside of working as leisure (when you are a paid employee):

If you are reading this book, you probably are not working because of no other reason than just for the action of work itself. Expecting the workplace to live up to the lofty ideals and advice propagated by billionaires who for “work for leisure” sets unrealistic expectations of the workplace, your team members, your boss and the company you work for.

The most damaging is that your self-worth is negatively impacted as it is almost impossible to fully express your full potential at work because of your expectations of yourself and your life and what a work experience is supposed to be about.

Your will also waste a lot of energy after hours and spend significant amounts of money in pursuing personal development activities related to creating more “passion” at work instead of possibly just finding hobbies where you can explore what leisure is truly like, while you recharge your batteries and build self-worth independent from who and how you think you should show up at work.

Large corporations are also starting to embrace these ideas, and I have noticed marketing materials speaking this language of “passion” while encouraging their employees to work longer hours and contribute to new product and service development (for no additional reward than “achieving mastery, purpose and autonomy” based on Dan Pink’s motivation factors.

It does not mean that you cannot have fun at work and be passionate about what you do – it just means that you need to always remember that your work is not your leisure – and to separate those concepts clearly at work and in your personal life