The following is a response to Alain de Botton, on his new blog site theschooloflife.typepad.com/lifeclass/ and in reference largely to his persuasive and beautifully written book, ‘The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work’.

FROM MAKING A LIVING TO MAKING A LIFE

At school, studying Physics, I learnt that work is defined as the application of effort or energy to an object. Unless we choose to stay in bed all day, forever, then we will all be applying effort, and that is work (happening inside or outside our ‘workplace’).

This for me is the irreducible inevitability of our work. And this is not the same as saying that it is inevitable that we have to, are forced to, work for the money we need. Because we aren’t. Most of the people reading this blog choose to go to the desk, the cubicle, the factory, wherever we do our work. I have recently been in Mumbai, and I saw that the beggars on the street, doing no work as we would conceive it, and apparently unable, like us, to choose the cubicle, nevertheless exhibit a great range of creative choices in how they beg.

So this is another apparent inevitability: within the reality that we are doomed to apply effort, we will (not just can) always choose how we do that. And part of that choosing involves how we choose to think, what we choose to focus on, what we choose to make powerful in that thinking.

I have been thinking about, writing about and, as a consultant, working on work for nearly twenty years. And what I have noticed about those who either complain about their work, or tell us that we are destined to suffer at work, is that they are doing one of two things (or sometimes both):

1. they are ignoring their own pleasure in work. Alain himself does not say that he resents his work – his applied effort – in philosophy, or does it under the compulsion of others or circumstance. All the evidence – the excellence of the writing, the success in book sales,  the seeking of a popular and pragmatic acceptance of philosophy in the world, the opening of a School – suggests that he is finding some form of satisfaction in his work and wants to explore wider and deeper expressions of it. Why is that different from anyone else? Why should Alain be a Chosen One? (That’s another widely accepted myth, that only some blessed people are in a position to enjoy work). Furthermore – and he is not alone in this – he uses beautifully crafted words, chosen with real care, to express his suggestion that others might be trapped or tricked in their own work, or delusional in their attempts to find a better way. Why can that same care over every application of effort, in this case the tools of writing, not be a similar source of satisfaction in any craft, or employment, no matter how seemingly banal. I am writing this in Johannesburg on the eve of Mandela Day, on which the world will celebrate a man who was literally trapped, and nevertheless refused to be bowed. This refusal, I believe, is more powerful in any of our lives than describing and justifying ourselves as imprisoned.

1. the second thing the work-deniers do is choose to select some ways of thinking, some objects of focus, above others, and then declare their selections as The Truth. Many commentators will not see the topic of work in any other context other than a political or historical one. It is easy then to talk of ‘the worker’ as an impersonal object of Capitalism, or the Bourgeoisie, and thence go into areas of ‘exploitation’. And from that objective, distanced, analytical thinking it is easy to demonstrate that even the person who is finding enjoyment in their work can be seen to be simply unconscious of how trapped or abused they really are. But this is only one way of perceiving our lives. I prefer to think from the inside out. You might tell me I am a naive pawn of the Capitalist system, but even if you could prove that to be true, it is not useful to me, in my own absolutely not impersonal, not objective life, to think that way. And that’s a distinction that matters: there is a difference in my life between what may be ‘true’ or ‘real’ or ‘fact’, and what I can use to shape how I live. What matters most to me is the control I have over what I think, say and do, and what that produces. If I am not happy with what I am producing, then I can rail all I want against the system, but unless I can change my thinking, saying and doing – and influence others with those choices – then nothing is going to change (we are back to Mandela here). And that is itself a choice. The other thing I have noticed about many people unhappy in the work they do is how apparently protective they are of their misery. They seem to argue for their imprisonment.

The opposite of seeing the difficulty inherent in work is not, as is sometimes implied, to take on a fantasy that work can be a Nirvana of joy, fun and satisfaction. Work can never be that, because it is a part of life, and subject to the same conditions. The philosophical stance – I understand – encourages us to see that the difficulties of life cannot be avoided, and that wisdom or growth (I may be getting the terms wrong) results necessarily from first accepting and then learning from the challenges. So too I believe that a healthy way to approach our work is to find a way or form in which to express our best efforts, whatever it is we do for a living. And then to see the sources of discomfort – which will be always with us whether we are working in a cubicle or working in a vocation to help the poor in Mumbai – as themselves sources of insight about ourselves (and not as proof of an unjust world). And any workplace is full of those opportunities. In this way, we can stop complaining about our boss, and start exploring our own issues with power, authority, dependence and influence. We can stop complaining about our company’s business practices in the market, and start developing our own personal integrity and honesty and choice over what we are part of.

A measure of how much I believe these things is I hope expressed in what I say to my three children about work. I cannot accept that I will be doing my best for them if I tell them that, whatever they do, there’ll be, in the end, a world out there exploiting and imprisoning them, and laughing at their attempts to be free and powerful.