Work

"I've concluded," wrote Wisconsin-based business editor Steve Prestegard, "that you should not love your job, because your job does not love you." And that comes pithily close to being all that needs to be said on the subject, although I also like what Loyola University Professor of Philosophy A.R. Gini (The Importance of Being Lazy) once asserted:

[Most Americans] agree to accept boring, meaningless work in return for a paycheck big enough to buy goods and activities that will compensate them during their leisure hours...When most Americans go to work, they strike a bargain with the devil.

The notion that you can find satisfaction and fulfillment in what you do for pay -- "do what you love and the money will follow," etc. -- is a lovely fiction but in this society (maybe most) is largely a non-starter. It is not an impossible goal, but one can waste a lot of time and energy on it and never come close to achieving it. That would describe me -- for a long time, I thought I could solve my problems by finding the right line of work. From a more mature perspective, that "paycheck big enough..." that Gini refers to is, I see, what really counts. I'd have no problem whatsoever not working for pay at all, but I'm not independently wealthy, and if society requires me to put in my 40 hours a week to keep the questionable engine of the whole running, I can do that, albeit somewhat grudgingly.

There are, of course, small satisfactions to be found in those 40 hours; one tries to make sure that there are, otherwise the passage of that time would truly be unbearable. But the key question is this: how much of your work would you replicate in your personal life if you weren't being paid? The answer for most of us is pretty clear: precious little. Even the work relationships that help us get through the week are mainly situational relationships that evaporate once the context is lacking. I don't know why this should be true, since relationships formed at schools and in other unpaid situations often last a lifetime. But I am sure that it is true: work friendships are disposable, and people ought to be wary of placing too much faith in them -- they can't bear the weight. Truly, your job does not love you.