Work Gives Life Meaning?

Interesting read from a June 29 Sunday's Straits Times. I don't think I feel the same way as Sumiko for now...but who knows..one day, I might find the meaning to work too.

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June 29, 2008
Work gives life meaning
Life would be awful if I didn't have to work. Yes, I
live to work rather than work to live

By Sumiko Tan
A friend recently shocked everyone by quitting his
high-flying job to embark on a fresh start in another
industry.

Another friend is thinking of a career switch. He puts
in very high-tempo 15-hour days in the office and
still has to take documents home to read. He's sick of
the frenetic pace.

Next month, a colleague will be giving up her job to
work just three days a week. Her son has turned one
and she wants to be there to see him grow.

Yet another colleague is planning for the day his son
enters Primary 1. Either he or his wife would want to
retire then, to be around to guide the boy. As she
earns more than he does, he might be the one to call
it quits.

Unless you are a student, retiree or housewife, so
much of a person's life centres on that concept called
work - where to work, what sort of work, are you happy
at work, should you work?

The workplace has long become more than just a place
you check into five days a week to fulfil some form of
labour for which you are paid at the end of the month.

A colleague put it aptly: Work is a creche for adults,
providing structure, stimulation and sustenance.

Here is also where you find friendship, companionship
and love even, and you can be guaranteed it's among
like-minded people. After all, you are similar enough
to seek a job in the same area of interest.

So many of my friends found their mates either at the
office or through work.

Who needs dating agencies when you can lock eyes and
check the other person out across the conference
table? Who needs speed dating when there are as many
potential dates to consider as there are cubicles (of
single people, of course) in the office?

When I was on leave recently, the first week stretched
gloriously ahead. I felt free from the endless e-mail,
irritating phone calls and petty politics that are, of
course, also a part of the modern workplace.

Time was mine to fritter away as I hung out with my
family and friends, went shopping and had long lunches
without having to check my watch to see if my lunch
hour was over.

There were no schedules to follow, no bosses to avoid
or report to, and no subordinates to nanny.

Then, as always happens when I'm on long leave, the
longing set in.

I started to miss my colleagues; I missed dressing up
each morning and setting off for work looking and
feeling 'professional'; I missed being needed; I
missed the sense of having a purpose in my life; I
missed the bustle of the office; I missed the lunches,
the shared food, the jokes and the gossip, the
community of the workplace; I actually missed my
cubicle life.

People are investing such long hours at work that we
can't help but measure our self-worth by what happens
there. So much of how good we feel about ourselves
hinges on how well our careers are going.

It is the reason promotion and bonus season in the
office is so dreaded. It has the ability to make us
giddy with happiness or downright depressed. Rightly
or wrongly, we define ourselves by the promotional
increments and bonuses we get, or don't.

I've a friend who knows this only too well. Six months
ago, he decided to quit his job because he felt he
wasn't being recognised for the long hours and hard
work he was putting in.

It felt good, the first two months. He slept in,
played computer games and did some serious clubbing.
He deserved a break.

But when he finally decided it was time to get another
job, it wasn't easy. The economy had gone south by
then. Month after month went by without a job offer,
and desperation has since set in.

The inability to find a job takes a toll on a person's
mental and physical health, and it is a far worse toll
than the one you suffer when you have a job and are
overworked.

Besides self-esteem, much of the pain one has to bear
when jobless has to do with the more mundane issue of
money.

The colleague who is planning to work part-time has
this cautionary tale.

She recently withdrew $1,000 before setting off for a
designer sale. As $1,000 is the daily withdrawal limit
for ATMs, she asked her husband if he would need to
take out cash that day too.

'When he found out what I was planning to use the
money for, his eyes popped and I quickly reassured
him: 'Of course I'm not going to spend everything.
It's just in case,' ' she said.

After he recovered, he told her, half-jokingly: 'It's
okay. Anyway, you're still working now.'

While she knows he wasn't really serious, it hit her
then that she'd have to start watching her spending
very carefully after she loses her full-time benefits.
'No more impulse buys accompanied by the comforting
thought that I darn well deserve this treat after
slogging so hard,' she said wistfully.

'I think it's the financial independence that I'm
going to miss the most.'

I've been in the workforce since I graduated in 1985,
working in the same company doing the same job. That's
23 years.

Save for annual three-week vacation stretches and the
occasional long weekend holiday, I have never not
worked.

I'm not complaining. In fact I think I'm lucky.

Even before I started work and, in those days when it
was not usual for teenagers to take on internships or
part-time jobs, I really wanted to work. I did
modelling jobs which made me a princely sum of $3,500.

I love working, and I especially love the freedom that
comes with earning my own keep.

I was thrilled to pay my first income tax because it
was proof of my independence and proof that I had the
ability to look after myself. While I no longer look
at my tax assessment letter with any fondness, I still
regard it with some pride.

And I love working within an office structure. I like
the hierarchy and I like the predictability of a
regular work day. The dependable income, paid health
care, vacations and training don't hurt either.

I know I will never get rich being an office drone but
it doesn't matter.

Perhaps it has to do with how my father had his own
business which he operated from home, occasionally
with the help of a secretary.

I always felt being a one-man show was a dreadfully
hard and lonely way to make a living. The cyclical ups
and downs of entrepreneurship are not for me, even if
chances of striking it big are bigger than if you were
a mere employee.

I'm not a workaholic but I veer towards the view that
one should live to work rather than work to live.

Maybe it's because I have no family of my own and few
interests outside of work. I do also realise that it
can be a problem if work forms the entire ecosystem of
my happiness.

But what I've also learnt is that while people - both
inside the office and outside - can let you down and
will do so, solid hard work can't and won't.

There's nothing more satisfying than rolling up your
sleeves, putting in an honest day's work and seeing
the results.

There are those who point out that no one in his right
mind would say on his death bed that he wished he had
spent more time at the office.

I disagree for, to me, the office is where so much of
what matters in life emanates.

Call me a fool, perhaps. But at least I'm a fool who
likes hard work.

sumiko@sph.com.sg