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One man holds his head at his desk; a man jumps for joy.

Saad Akhtar has been documenting his life on TikTok for a while now. From the outside, he's got it all. He's 25, living in New York City, and working his way up the ranks in finance. He's also engaging and funny enough to rack up hundreds of thousands of followers on social media through his updates.

But there was definitely a sad pattern emerging in his videos. His stress and anxiety over his soul-sucking corporate job was leaking into the content. One update, a lengthy early-morning rant, was captioned "Try not to crash out with me before work." In others, he laments the never-ending barrage of work emails and the poor treatment by his boss. For weeks, he openly toyed with the idea of quitting.

And then one day in early May, he finally pulled the plug on his "finance bro" career.

Akhtar bought himself a cake to celebrate the occasion. On his last day of work, he filmed a giddy video before heading in to ultimately clock out for the last time. The next day, he woke up at the usual time—5 a.m.—just to experience those same early morning hours as a free man. The video he filmed is pure magic.

As a free, unemployed human being, Akhtar literally and physically frolics through the streets of New York. You might think he's running at first, as in, for exercise. But no. This is a frolic.

"My days of being a finance bro are over," he shouts excitedly. "I'm free! I'm free"

"I quit my job. I can do whatever I want. I can live my life. ... I can be a baker. I can be a painter. ... I'm gonna go see the sunrise right now from the Brooklyn Bridge. I've never been able to do this in my life."

It's actually pretty emotional and beautiful. There's a whole wide world out there. Akhtar's been too busy "staring at the back of other desks" to go explore it. Until now, anyway.

@sodakhtar

my first 5am morning as a free man #quit #quitmyjob

Over four million people tuned in to watch Akhtar's joyous celebration of newfound freedom and it struck a nerve in all of them.

Commenters couldn't contain their excitement for him. Others found that his bravery to cut the cord gave them hope for their own lives:

"I haven’t been this happy for a stranger in a minute"

"I’m crying. It shouldn’t cost us this much to exist."

"May everyone experience this in their lifetime"

"Every goodhearted person in a corporate job desperately wants to quit"

"being up at 5am knowing you don’t have to work is such a good feeling"

The freedom of unemployment is absolutely intoxicating, so it's no wonder people are mesmerized by the viral video. When my wife and I moved to a new city a little over a decade ago and had a week before starting at our new school and job, respectively, it was incredible. Waking up with each day full of possibility and exploration and adventure was really the thrill of a lifetime. Living life like a tourist, seeing new parts of the city, eating good food, making time for rest and play.

It's a damn shame we don't get to live like that all the time.

@sodakhtar

1:32 am biking cuz im free, Alhumdulillah for it all ❤️ #freedom #unemployment

Job burnout is at an all-time high, studies find. That means a majority of people find the demands of their job impossible to meet, and all the while they're working extra hours and struggling to keep up, they can still barely pay the bills.

A majority of working Americans find that they barely have the capacity to go on. Akhtar is far from the only one feeling that way.

What's exciting is that Gen Z—which includes people like Akhtar—is really leading the charge for better work-life balance. They're a generation that refuses to settle. That means they get mocked for setting hard boundaries with work, not wanting to answer emails after hours, and maxing out their vacation days, but honestly... good for them. They're the ones who will ultimately, hopefully drive some change and bring us back to a world where working 9-5 and leaving work at work is the norm.

As for Akhtar, he may have to return to the corporate workforce eventually, especially if he wants to keep living in New York City. But for now he's making the most of his unemployment with a recent trip to Australia, whimsical bike rides through the city, time with friends, and documenting it all for his growing TikTok channel.

Best of all, he's staying up late living his life to the fullest, and leaving the 5 a.m. wake-ups in the past.

True
RockefellerFoundation

If you spend much time with young kids, you're sure to encounter one question: "Can you tell me a story?"

For all except the most gifted storytellers among us, it can cause a moment of anxiety. "What story do I tell?"you ask yourself. You want to fill little heads with wholesome and encouraging ideas — damsels in distress and damagingly masculine heroes are all out of the question. But on the other hand, spinning a completely original tale on the spot is a pretty tall order.

This is one story that you might be able to tell kids is true just a few years from now:


This is what life could look like for women in 2025.

Posted by Upworthy on Wednesday, April 26, 2017

It's wonderful to imagine a world run by both women and men. But as of right now, it's still a fantasy.

In the first part of 2017, there were only 27 female CEOs leading Fortune 500 companies. What's worse? That's a record high. Women hold only 12% of board seats worldwide, and only 4% of boards around the world are chaired by women — which makes it even harder to set policies that allow women to rise to leadership positions.

Photo via iStock.

It's time for us — all of us — to end the gender inequality that dictates corporate culture.

It's in everyone's best interest to have more women at the executive level. Companies with female leaders tend to have policies that grant more generous family leave and make progress toward narrowing the gender pay gap. Research also suggests that female-led businesses are better at creating inclusive workplace cultures, meaning that gender diversity helps increase other types of diversity, too.

Oh, and also? Financially, companies with female leaders knock it out of the park.

Photo via iStock.

The Rockefeller Foundation's goal of 100 (or more!) women CEOs of Fortune 500 companies by 2025 means charting the path of progress toward a fairer, better world of work.

"100x25" may be ambitious, but it could — and should — become reality. With more women at the helm, we'll also see increased opportunities for people of all identities at every level. When the work world is fairer, it will be possible for everyone to write their own story.

So when that happens and you hear, "Can you tell me a story?" you'll know just which one to tell: ours.

Meet Nic Smith. He's got some powerful things to say.

Nic, who works at a Waffle House in Virginia, comes from a long line of union coal miners. His grandfathers were coal miners. His great-grandfathers were coal miners. Cousins, uncles, you name it. However, the coal industry has been shedding jobs for a while now. And, while President-elect Donald Trump has promised to bring all those coal jobs back, Nic isn't buying it.

In the video below, he lays out the facts pretty clearly as to why. Really bluntly.

If you don't have time to watch all of his powerful answers, here are the highlights of what Nic had to say:


1. "Coal's not coming back."

Yeah, Trump has claimed he's going to bring back all the coal jobs. But according to experts, those jobs are just not coming back, between automation of systems and lower demand for the polluting energy source. From 2008-2012 alone, the coal industry lost almost 50,000 jobs while natural gas, wind, and solar all had huge gains in the same time period.

2. "Ain't no damn immigrant stole a coal job. I'll tell you that right now."

"Even if they did," he continued, "would you be blaming the immigrants or the people that hired them? The only reason they'd hire an immigrant over an American citizen is if it benefits their wallets."

He's right. The reality is that uneducated immigrants are vying for different jobs than American workers.

3. "I do $2.35 an hour plus tips. ... We need $15 an hour."

In a second video, Nic explains how little he earns, by waiting tables at the local Waffle House. He makes $2.35 per hour plus tips, unless those tips are less than minimum wage, then he makes $7.35 per hour. He'd make more as a cook on the grill on most nights than he does as a waiter, but even that isn't enough to support himself. It's only $15,000 per year.

In Dickenson County, Virginia, where Nic lives, 1 in 5 people live below the poverty line, and the average income is barely half that of the rest of Virginia.

4. "[Trump supporters] are desperate to believe in something."

The reason many blue-collar workers and low-income people in the coal industry voted for Trump? "There's 80% [of people], they're struggling day to day," Nic says. "The only industry they've got there is coal, and they're trying to hold onto what little bit there is. And they really don't care what it takes to keep that industry there or bring it back. "

If there's one thing Nic hopes people take away from his interview, it's that we can't ignore people in dying industries.

"If we invested in Appalachian people and helped diversify the economy, these people would stop clinging to coal," he says. "There is a culture-wide Stockholm syndrome we have with the coal industry, and people don't get that."

You can learn more about Fight for $15 here.

If Google was at a holiday party with the rest of the Fortune 500 companies, it would definitely have a New Year's resolution worth bragging about.

The company intends to be powered entirely be renewable energy in 2017.

Image via iStock.


Now those other Fortune 500 companies might go, "Hold on, Google, not so fast. We know you're one heck of an impressive tech company, but you employ over 60,000 people all over the world! Think you might want to set a more realistic goal?"

To which Google would probably say, "Nah, I'm good."

Of course, this isn't the kind of goal you hit overnight. Google has been laying the groundwork to hit this "landmark moment" for years.

Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert. Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images.

According to a post on Google's blog by senior vice president of technical infrastructure, Urs Hölzle, Google is the largest corporate buyer of renewable energy in the world. Last year, the company purchased 44% of the power needed to run the entire company from solar and wind farms, but it began pursuing renewable energy much earlier than that.

In 2010, Google contracted with 114-watt wind farm in Iowa. The company also became one of three investors of the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System (ISEGS), the world's largest solar power tower plant back in 2011. Oh and no big deal, but Google's been working toward carbon neutrality (meaning its energy production cancels out its emissions) since 2007.

Photo via Google. Used with permission.

So yeah, you could say Google had a bit of a head start on its 2017 New Year's resolution.

If you're thinking this is the kind of initiative that only a company like Google can do because Google has a ton of money and renewable energy is expensive, think again.

According to Google's extensive environmental report, the cost of wind and solar energy has dropped 60%-80% over the last six years. So not only is that 2017 renewable energy goal good for the planet, it's good for their business as well. And if there's anything most companies can get behind, it's saving money.

All in all, Google has invested more than $2.5 billion in renewable energy sources all over the world and also works to help other organizations lower their emissions as part of its commitment to doing whatever it can to combat the very real threat climate change poses to our planet.

Photo via Google. Used with permission.

Google isn't alone in trying to make a shift toward renewable energy. Microsoft reports that its been carbon neutral since 2012. Pearson, the world's largest education company has been committed to total carbon neutrality since 2009, and has maintained it ever since. And that's just two of 100 companies in the United States that have committed to operating on 100% renewable energy sources in the next few years.

According to data collected by the Climate Group, if companies worldwide committed to this endeavor, global carbon emissions would drop by 15%.

In cleaning up their energy acts, companies like Google, Microsoft, and Pearson are setting a great example for other companies worldwide to follow.

Photo by AFP.

It will take a certain amount of initiative, especially from smaller companies, to make a full shift to renewable energy. Even Google is facing some challenges in meeting its 2017 goal. For one, its data centers require the most amount of energy, and even though use of artificial intelligence has cut the need down by 15%, needs keep mounting.

Google is determined to keep pushing forward, facing each new challenge as it arises because combatting climate change is a marathon, not a sprint. And thanks to the climate summit in Paris in 2015, more countries' industries are taking up similar emissions pledges.

The clean energy gauntlet has been thrown by some of the most influential companies in the world. Hopefully their resolutions will inspire others who don't want to be left behind in the pollution dust.