Monday 20 March 2006

Work

Work.
Now there's a concept.
There is so much to say about this subject.

What you say is correct.
What I say is (also) correct.
And what many others have said is also correct.
This is an area of discourse which each side (of which there are many) could go on about, swapping "serves", almost forever (and there are plenty enough commentators).
Since there are some that, quite cogently, argue that work constitutes a great portion of our time and our self-image and mental well-being, then it would be right to consider the issues of work in depth, and from many angles, in order to understand and then apply one's knowledge, for a better life for oneself, if for no other (more glorified) reason.

I just got this little interesting piece of information about work sent to me:

"They make up for than half of the work force. They work longer hours than everyone else in the company. From their ranks come most of the top managers. They're the midcareer employees, the solid citizens between the ages of 35 and 55 whom companies bank on for their loyalty and commitment. And they're not happy. In fact, they're burned out, bored and bottlenecked, new research reveals. Only 33% of the 7,700 workers the authors surveyed feel energized by their work; 36% say they're in dead end jobs. One in three is not satisfied with his or her job. One in five is looking for another. Companies are ill prepared to manage this group because it is so pervasive, largely invisible, and culturally uncharted. That neglect is bad for business: Many companies risk losing some of their best people or - even worse - ending up with an army of disaffected people who stay."

from
"Managing Middlescence"
Robert Morison, Tamara Erickson, Ken Dychtwald.
Harvard Business Review Boston:Mar 2006. Vol. 84, Iss. 3, p. 78-86

The implication of this abstract is that work is important, and that it is not being treated with enough respect within organisations - particularly for a whole range of disaffected workers. Luckily for you, you currently just miss out on the age range they mention. Unluckily for me, I do not.

Your comments about your work strike me as much about doing something which one considers worthwhile, as it does about "work" in a slightly narrower definition (of turning up to an office to do something to earn some money). It is the concept of alienation from work (for the proletariat - a la Marx) - in both its positive and negative aspects.

There is the wider definition of work. It can have a definite spiritual dimension. Gurdjieff was a relatively recent mystic who emphasised that one "works" (in the classic sense of working and earning a living) and that this "work", if done in the correct manner (there were a whole range of other things which accompanied this), then that would lead to spiritual development (and ultimately enlightenment). The founding Protestants (especially the Methodists and Calvinists) were very strong on the concept of work. Dr Martin Luther King said: "All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence."

The wider definition can have work being anything which one works at and which therefore can easily be something which provides pleasure and enhancement and many other elements.

And if this is what work is for one, then so much the better, since there is a great alignment between what one is doing and what one wants to do and one finds fulfilment in. These are the lucky people in the world.

One of the things to consider though is that not everyone may be so lucky - either from the start or somewhere through the process. These people that are "alienated" from their work must still work in order to earn money, and sometimes must engage in the most soul destroying of work in order to survive. Obviously, there are extremes here, since, due to the sheer number of people involved in this "condition", the sliding scales are minutely graduated - one example for every possible variation on the "theme" could no doubt be found somewhere in the world, and most likely in any country (although some countries would have the scale skewed one way or another more than other countries - thus the well-to-do first world countries would have more people earning good money and living an easy life yet still suffering an existenstial alienation from their work (and life, indeed) - more so than those living in poor third-world countries, who may be alienated from their work (think, factory line workers in sweat shops) but still lead a life of deprivation and, maybe, despair (maybe not).).

A careful reading of literature etc relating to this alienation would shed some light on this condition, and what it might mean to the society that these people live in, and provide a small amount of insight into the motivations behind certain acts. The more extreme forms of alienation, both work wise, but more generally from the society as a whole (even the global social concept currently in vogue), can lead to extreme forms of reaction - anger, violence, even terrorism (so-called, although it is now, unfortunately, become a catch-phrase to describe a bevy of issues and circumstances and acts that are generally undifferentiated and undiscerning).

Actually experiencing an element of the same alienation can, at times, assist in understanding what people are going through, and what drives certain behaviours (as opposed to others, which, we as "rational" individuals with a certain world-view, would consider sub-optimal or detrimental).

There is an element of actually experiencing this alienation that I am talking about when I talk about work and what it means, to me, at the moment.

Mind you, sometimes, having had an experience of this sort of alienation does not necessarily assist in making one's behaviour or reactions when dealing with certain types of situation any better - sometimes, one simply repeats (falls back on) previous learned responses. More so the pity for oneself, for one's organisation and for society.

Aristotle said: "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."
Partially, this is what work is about. It is about doing things to be excellent, so that one is excellent all the time.

I surmise that there is an element of this in what you have said - that it gives you great pleasure to be the best that you can be, and the best that others expect you to be, through your work. The quote by Theodore I. Rubin probably sums up some of the attitude: "Happiness does not come from doing easy work but from the afterglow of satisfaction that comes after the achievement of a difficult task that demanded our best."

Or to put it another way, in another quote:
"When we do the best that we can, we never know what miracle is wrought in our life, or in the life of another." - Helen Keller

Aristotle also said "Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work" and backed it up with "All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind".
I could not agree more with the latter comment. Back we go to the concept of alienation from work, due to the nature of it having to be paid work. If your work does not need to encompass any concept of needing to be paid for (in that you are either independently wealthy, or, psychologically, do not have a notion that you have to work in order to be paid, or do not need to be paid, whether for work or not), then, according to Aristotle, there can be no question of alienation from work - and working into ever increasing pleasure will result in rewarded perfection, or, alternately and as effectively, increased perfection in work will be rewarded with pleasure.

But, see, I was also talking about a range of other things, possibly well expressed by Krishnamurti when he said: "You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life."

I am very much interested in the fact that a complete or whole life has many constitutes, of which work is only one. How to integrate all these elements into a fulfilling whole - especially when faced with a range of barriers - past learned behaviour, economic considerations, social and familial commitments, and many other issues - is an interesting exercise, which is engaging more of the population today (given the "aging" population in the first world, with more people living loinger with more money, able or needing to contemplate these issues for longer in their life).

This is the wider definition of what work may be about, or indeed, completely redefining the question. It is, indeed, something which has been ongoing for millenia, and repeatedly revisited with each new generation, in their own manner, in their own time, at the right time for them.

Each age, in the journey in life, has its own answer to fulfil - and, then, creates the questions for the answers they are living.

As I go about contemplating the questions and adhering the answers, there are valid alternate opinions and ideas which must not be forgotten, must not be ignored. Hence the value of conversation and discussion with others, through which one can be open and querulous.

Thus, as a result of such investigation and discussion, one of the elements I am forgetting is this:
"The conditions of conquest are always easy. We have but to toil awhile, endure awhile, believe always, and never turn back." - Marcus AAnnaeus Seneca
and
"Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance." - Samuel Johnson
and
"He who labors diligently need never despair; for all things are accomplished by diligence and labor." - Menander
and (my favourite - simply due to the awesome output from this man)
"I was made to work; if you are equally industrious, you will be equally successful." - Johann Sebastian Bach

I have lost the will to continually toil, to never doubt, never look back, never stop.
I am sure that it is a temporary event, and, indeed, it only relates to a few select situations. There are a range of things which don't interest me, don't have the "pull" to maintain the motivation and drive the engine of toil. There are plenty of situations where I put in quite a deal of effort. Doesn't seem to make much reward (over and above what is expected or known to happen). This simply compounds the sense of loss, and the lack of energy to continue to toil. Cycle and spiral conspire.

futures ineffectualness

Work has a place (especially in the Ethical life - as per Kierkegaard - or his antagonist in the book) and executing work in the appropriate manner with the appropriate attitude/mind is an important part of living a proper life.
Yet work, as we all know, is not all in life.
And business has even less a claim on life than work has - it is a pale cousin to proper work - yet assumes too great an importance and leads one astray (as a painted harlot of siren call for riches and fame).

And so I have been consolidating on the mental/psychological/spiritual improvement in re work and relationships that I started in the previous job I just had and have continued, albeit in a slightly different manner, in this job.

There is an element of adjusting to work and doing particular work (whatever it may be) for a while, until other conditions relating to my life are modified, and then looking at more radical choices associated with work and activity. There are lots of plans that I have - too many plans to actually be executed in the one lifetime that I have available to me (assuming that I will even live for a long time).

And it is certainly the case that whilst I may plan for, think about, fantazise over many different potential futures and types of work (or activities) that I could do in the future, it is virtually certain that what actually transpires in the future will be different from what I have thought and dreamt about. I am sure that, maybe, some of it will be somewhat similar, but it is just as likely that it will be completely different.

Which is an interesting concept to contemplate and address (psychologically). On the one hand, it provides a wonderful weird sort of hope for the future - hope that whatever things are like now, the future will provide something new and different, sufficiently new and different enough, to not be the same as before (in one's mind - of course, from an "identity" perspective, nothing EVER is the same as before, nor ever could be, due to the transpiration of time) that one will be invigorated and assaulted with the necessity to address life - and, therefore, as such, to live life - to engage and thereby make something worthwhile of the life lived, simply by the act of living that life in a conscious and wilful
manner. This is a good thing!

On the other hand, it is a little disconcerting to know that whatever you may think and hope for is essentially hopeless, it will never happen - and, therefore, why hope? Why bother to think, or plan, or contemplate the future?

Faced with one's ineffectualness, why bother at all - just let it all slide by, since whatever will happen is not known to us, and will happen anyway.

And it is further disconcerting to realise that one realises this and yet one still plans and dreams and hopes and thinks, way into the future, constantly turning and refining and stucturing and organising whatever it is that should be happening (and yet may never happen).
And then to realise that all of these positions, contradictory as they are, are all valid, all at the one time, and that one must hold them all in one's mind, all at once, and then still move forward, through an effort of WILL, which does, indeed, create whatever one will be moving into for the future.

Enough!