Is it time to Redefine work?
Is work the whole of life or a necessary evil?
Work is what we do to stay alive. From the dawn of time, work of one sort or another has been the means for us to provide ourselves and our families with food, clothing and shelter. But as civilisation developed, work became quantified and commodified. In some industrialised nations, it’s still a badge of honour to boast of the hours we put into our work as if being busy is a virtue in itself. But the more enlightened measure their success by output rather than input, in other words, by what they achieve rather than the time they spend achieving it.
You will have heard the aphorism: ‘work to live, not live to work’. According to this logic, ‘living to work’ is misguided because we should do just enough work to provide for our needs and then enjoy the rest of life. But there is a flaw in this thinking. By this logic, ‘work’ is not a part of life. It’s just something we have to do to get on with our ‘living’ when the work is done.
If you take the average worker in an office job, they will be inside for daylight hours five days a week, and (at least in pre-pandemic times!) usually also commute to and from the premises. A typical working day might be at least nine hours, including travel time and a lunch break. If we count the hours until we can go home and live our real lives, then are we saying that our work, which takes up a significant amount of our time, is not living?
Or are the happiest and most fulfilled people those who enjoy their work and see it as an integral part of their life and of who they are, rather than a place they go to do a job, just counting off the hours until they can go home?
Work is good
Work is a God-given mandate:
The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. (Genesis chapter 2 v 15, NIV)
Timothy Kim was just 30 years old when he became a millionaire through stock-market trading. He says that he soon got bored when he no longer had to work for a living. He said this in a CNBC report:
…those who prioritize accumulating wealth are left thinking “now what?” once they hit their goal… “If someone gives you $100 million and…