Really? Quality, not quantity. An hour with my wife is more meaningful to me than half my day at work. No job will make up for that, unless I'm changing the world. So yes. It's just a job. Your (not you specifically, but anyone) startup is just a job.

So because your wife give you a 100 happiness factor(tm), you are now indifferent when choosing between jobs that give you a 20 or 80 happiness factor?

Or are you saying that your meaningfulness bar is so high that no job can possibly clear it? What if you and your wife worked together?

For the most part, we get to choose our lives. I reject the idea that time spent working can't be meaningful.

Or maybe he's saying that access to his wife is dependent on the Goldman Sachs job.

If he loses the 20-factor-job he loses the 100-factor-wife.

Definitely not. :)

I'm just saying that - to me - a job is just a means to some end. That end (for me) is providing for my family adequately. That I happen to enjoy what I do is an extra bonus. I'm just saying not to lose sight of why we do what we do. If you start placing too much importance on a job, you let your job define you. IMHO, it's much more empowering to remember that your job is just a tool like any other.

Agreed. My job is a means to an end, not a personal definition. I'm a husband and father first. I love the job I have now because it's just a job. I do interesting programming. I work 40, zero overtime. My time is flexible, I can come or go as I please as long as I put in the time. I can take a vacation day with zero notice.

I purposefully got a job that really is "just" a job so I could not only put food on the table but be there to enjoy it as well.