Listening to this short interview about work being the new American religion brought back childhood memories for me. My father was a great proponent of "Work is Worship" and repeated this mantra often for my edification. He was never a particularly religious man until he retired. It was understood that I would grow up and work - more importantly, I would worship at the altar of that work.
In real terms that meant, doing the best I could every day and giving it all I had. That would be proof I was living an honorable life. While I was free from the pressures of achieving any specific career goals to prove I was a worthy daughter, it would be a betrayal to my father not to workship my work - whatever that may be.
He never found the capacity to worship family, friends and the other blessings he had received in his life. His work demanded all of his available resources. Since he retired, he has an abundance of time and no idea what to do with it. He struggled to settle into this new way of living for a decade before making a restive sort of peace with it. Observing him over the years, I have tried to strike a better balance in my life by making a large part of that work become the raising of J. I was able to bring the worship attitude to this particular "job" a lot easier. It also makes my soul rest easy to know that my father appreciates the effort I put into being a mother - I have not been a traitor to his cause.
I recently blogged about the guy who works for a website and fiddles with its content all the time in hopes of striking viral gold. It is hard to imagine worshipping such work. There are jobs worthy of worship perhaps - work that involves saving human lives, teaching young children, helping people down on their luck get back on their feet. Most of us, do not have such work to show for our existence. To that end, the cult of worshipping work becomes an unbearable burden. We feel deficient and flawed in some fundamental way.
In real terms that meant, doing the best I could every day and giving it all I had. That would be proof I was living an honorable life. While I was free from the pressures of achieving any specific career goals to prove I was a worthy daughter, it would be a betrayal to my father not to workship my work - whatever that may be.
He never found the capacity to worship family, friends and the other blessings he had received in his life. His work demanded all of his available resources. Since he retired, he has an abundance of time and no idea what to do with it. He struggled to settle into this new way of living for a decade before making a restive sort of peace with it. Observing him over the years, I have tried to strike a better balance in my life by making a large part of that work become the raising of J. I was able to bring the worship attitude to this particular "job" a lot easier. It also makes my soul rest easy to know that my father appreciates the effort I put into being a mother - I have not been a traitor to his cause.
I recently blogged about the guy who works for a website and fiddles with its content all the time in hopes of striking viral gold. It is hard to imagine worshipping such work. There are jobs worthy of worship perhaps - work that involves saving human lives, teaching young children, helping people down on their luck get back on their feet. Most of us, do not have such work to show for our existence. To that end, the cult of worshipping work becomes an unbearable burden. We feel deficient and flawed in some fundamental way.
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