On Einstein's assertion that "Work is the only thing that gives substanc...

Stream-of-Consciousness Free Associations on "PLAY"

My Stream-of-Consciousness Free Associations on the word, "WORK"

A Word with Marty: "WORK-LIFE BALANCE"

Guilty Pleasures

Is Work-Life Balance Overrated?

So much has been written urging us to strive for work-life balance. An offshoot of that is the exhortation to meditate, do yoga, etc.

There is an under-discussed counter-position. So my PsychologyToday.com article today offers an ego/alter-ego debate on the issue.

A Researcher Who'd Rather Work Than Be With Family or Have Fun: A mock career counseling session

My PsychologyToday.com article today is a mock career counseling session with a researcher who'd rather work long hours than have fun or be with family. Her husband objects.

Milking Every Heartbeat

Perhaps today’s #1 mantra is “work-life balance.” I think that’s misguided. I believe life is better-led when you spend as many heartbeats as possible, perhaps 60 or 70 hours a week, using your best abilities to make the biggest difference to society or at least to your sphere of influence. That’s what I call, milking your heartbeats.

My PsychologyToday.com article today makes the case for the wisdom of that and practically how to make it happen.

The Case For and Against Striving

From childhood, we’ve been urged to strive, to live up to our potential.
Too, a counterargument is often made—for work-life balance. The claim is that it’s healthier and certainly it's more family-friendly.

But rarely is an argument made for doing the minimum, the least you can get away with. Yet a perhaps not-foolish argument can be made for that.

So in my PsychologyToday.com article today, I make the argument for maximum striving and then for minimum. Sure, it’s possible that you’ll come away opting for the golden mean but perhaps not.

A Letter to New Grads: Three Questions to Ask Yourself

Should you strive more for excellence or for work-life balance? It's hard to have both.

Should you strive for big bucks or might there be a wiser career choice for you?

How relationship-centered should you be?

These hard questions are important for all of us to ponder but especially so for people just starting out. I briefly explore them in my PsychologyToday.com article today.

The Bee: A fable that raises stinging questions

My PsychologyToday.com article today is a short fable I wrote about a bee. It raises issues about how to live life. 

I'll be sending a big jar of exceptionally good honey to the commenter who I believe most thoughtfully answered to four questions I ask at the end of the fable.

Work-Life Balance is Overrated: Think Twice Before Dubbing People "Workaholics"

Many people who work long hours are more accurately described as "hard workers" or even "heroic" rather than "workaholics."  I make that case in my PsychologyToday.com article today. 

HERE is the link.

Days of Our Work Lives: An unvarnished look at work today: Part I: David's Saga. Episode 14: The Marriage

Days of Our Work Lives

Part I: David's Saga

Episode 14

The Marriage

In the previous episode, David and Susan settled into life in Sage River, doing their jobs remotely. Less stressed, they were able to work on their parenting skills.

Next, they turned to their marriage. Sitting by the fire, Susan began. "You know, we've become more like roommates than anything else."

"I just care more about work than you do. We only have a certain number of heartbeats. I believe life is best-led when we spend as many of them as possible contributing, being productive."

"That's just too Calvinist for me. I need to leave room for pleasure. If I work nonstop like you, I'll burn out."

"I did have two heart attacks, you'll recall."

"Well, shouldn't that have been a wake-up call?"

"It was, for a couple weeks, but then you somehow forget. Or you think, "Better a short but very productive life than a long and happy but less contributory one. I mean, I could be happy spending all day hiking with the dog, watching comedies, eating, having sex..."

"That's one thing we don't have."

"I don't know if it's just that my sex drive is lower than yours or that I'd simply rather be working."

"That scares me, David."

"Whatever the reason, that's who I am. You know it, I know it. We've tried everything: positions, fantasies, how-to books, toys, porn, sex therapist: 'Communicate your needs better, make date nights, light candles.' Same advice you get in Redbook but none of it works for us. Remember when we walked out of the therapist's office, you said, "For our 150 bucks, we'd probably get more benefit from retail therapy?"

"So what do we do?"

"What we are doing: accepting each other as-is. I've read a ton that says that mismatched sex drive is the most difficult sex problem to cure. We've worked hard at it for a decade and all it has done is made our relationship worse. I think we're wisest to follow The Serenity Prayer: accept what you can't change."

"That is a tough one to accept, David."

"Is there really only one definition of marriage? One definition of love?... Susan, do you love me?"

"I'm not sure what love is anymore."

"You know I love you and what that means for me is that I'm always glad to see you, be around you, do the things we enjoy doing together. And we have the memories of our years together. It gives our relationship substance. Isn't that enough?"

After a long silence, Susan changed the topic to common ground. "So, Mr. Only-So-Many Heartbeats, now that we're settled in Sage Valley, shouldn't we be doing some volunteer work?"

"Good point but what would make the biggest difference?"

HERE is the next episode.

Work-Life Balance is Overrated

Work/life balance is overrated. That's the contention of my USNews.com post today.

Some of the most contented, contributory and not-burned-out people I know have worked 60+ hours a week for a lifetime.

HERE is the link.

Four Approaches to the Life Well-Led

Here's an advance look at my next column for the Mensa publication, The Intelligencer.

Four Approaches to the Life Well-Led 

Countless authors have opined on how to live the life well-led but their approaches seem to distill to just four: pursue happiness, serve God, serve society/the universe, and pursue balance. Here are pros and cons of each:

Pursue happiness. Obviously, making choices based on what makes you happy leads to an enjoyable life. And you can define happiness more contributorily than just eating, having sex and watching comedies. Your definition of happiness might, for example, include the contentment that comes from being productive, whether as accounts payable clerk, cancer researcher, a friend, or school volunteer providing (badly needed) enrichment for Mensa-level kids.

A limitation of the pursue-happiness approach to life is that you’re less likely to do worthy but unpleasant tasks, for example, diving into icy waters to save a drowning person or be a Mother Teresa who, to save lives, worked amid Calcutta’s sewage stench, her ankles ever bitten by scorpions. Of course, there are more common examples. I know a top hand surgeon who, because he’s been doing that for decades, would find it more fun to play guitar gigs on evenings and weekends but recognizes  he’ll make a bigger difference spending that time seeing patients than playing Grateful Dead songs.

Serve God. For many people, religion is the prime driver of people’s lives. And it’s easy to understand why:

• Many people need rules or structure for their lives. Religion provides them.
• Many people need fear and reward to motivate them to follow rules. Religion provides them, for example, heaven and hell.
• Many people need support in life’s tough times: The belief in a loving God provides that.
• Following a deity’s rules magnifies the import of one’s actions.. It’s one thing to be kind for its own sake; it’s a bigger thing if you believe it’s part of a benevolent God’s plan.

A downside of religion is that it’s too black-and-white: There’s only one way. For example, the Bible says, “Thou shalt not steal,’ no exceptions--In many denominations, a poor person who steals a drug from a corporation to save a spouse’s life is deemed destined to burn in hell for eternity. Sure, individuals can perceive what they want in religion: Some claim the Bible condemns homosexuality; others insist the Bible endorses it. Some say the Koran encourages peaceful behavior, others that it demands jihad against the infidels. But net, a God-centric approach to life suffers from a narrow definition of acceptable behavior.

Another weakness of the serve-God approach is that it urges passivity. For example, the New Testament urges surrender to God, to trust God above reason: “Be not wise in your own eyes. God shall supply all your need.” (Philippians 4:19;) “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.” (Proverbs 3:1: )“If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matthew 17:20)

Serve society/the universe. This is the utilitarian approach: Ongoing, you decide which activity will most likely make the biggest difference. In the extremis, you could rate each of your life’s hours on how contributory it was: from -100 (making progress toward developing a mutated smallpox virus so communicable, deadly, and incurable that it would cause Armageddon) to +100: (working toward being a Messiah that would inspire everyone in the world to use their greatest powers to abet humankind as much possible.)

The serve-society approach has value even if your sphere of influence is small. For example, a ditch digger can decide whether, during a break, to have a cigarette or to teach a novice how to dig a ditch more easily. In turn, that novice will not only dig more efficiently but be equipped to teach others. The ditch digger has also, without preaching, shown the novice the value of giving, which makes that novice more likely to give to others. And those others, in turn, are more likely to give to others in this generation and in generations to come. So even a ditch digger’s impact can be significant enough to be worth the effort.

An even loftier variation on the serve-society approach is to serve a universal/cosmic good. For example, some people believe efforts to equate resources among people is a cosmic justice. Others believe that furthering meritocracy is more just.

But whether serving society or the universe, you can enhance your utility by focusing on what few others can or will do. For example, I champion the intellectually gifted at a time when government and non-profits focus on redistributing to “the least among us.” That way, I feel I make a bigger difference than if I focused on popular causes I believe in such as abortion rights, where my efforts would add a mere grain of sand onto a beach.

A downside of the serve-society/the universe approach to life is that it leads to a less pleasurable existence. That approach gives no brownie points to fun. Sure, adherents to the serve-society model may sometimes deviate from it and watch that silly sitcom but when life is done, devoted serve-society people die having experiencing less pleasure than do others.

And for some people, focusing so much on doing good for others could lead to burnout and, ironically, to doing less good than if they were moderate. However, based on the people I’ve known, you’re unlikely to burn out even from a lifetime of long workweeks as long as you’re working on something of value, are good at it, and have a measure of control over your work tasks. I’ll be 64 in June, been working 60+ hours a week for my entire life, and feel as energized as ever.

Another downside of the utilitarian approach is that an individual can do only so much. With seven billion people on the planet, your likelihood of making a big difference is small. Nevertheless, it strikes me that a life aimed at even minor contribution is better than rationalizing that you should pursue a pleasure-centric life because your potential for impact, in the largest scheme of things, is modest.

Strive for balance.  Many people believe their best shot at the ideal life is to work moderately and play moderately, dividing your time among serving yourself, God, and society. Or as many of our parents say, “Moderation in all things.”

The downside of that is that it assumes all those goals are of equal value. Can one say that a week on the beach is as valuable as a week mentoring Mensa kids?

Now it’s your turn.  In light of the above (and anything else,) do you want to write a word, sentence, and/or paragraph summarizing how you plan to live the life well-led?

A "Workaholic" in Action

It's been a busy few days. On top of my usual full docket of career counseling clients, writing my weekly AOL article and weekly USNews.com article, giving a talk to 100 people at Experience Unlimited, and responding to tons of email, I was on five radio shows, mainly questioning whether work-life balance is a goal we all should strive for.

Indeed work-life-balance activists would label me "out of balance" and a "workaholic," evoking comparison to "alcoholic," addicted to something bad.

In fact, it's all been inordinately energizing. And amid it all, I found time to garden, play the piano, hike every day with my doggie Einstein, help my 88-year-old mom, and hang out with my wife. I will admit I didn't spend any time watching TV, playing golf, etc.

In case you'd like to listen, here are the radio shows I've been on since Sunday:

Of course, I was on my own show (NPR-San Francisco) which I devoted to raising questions about three career "truths."

KGO's (ABC-San Francisco) Ronn Owens Program is among the most listened-to on the West Coast. Talkers magazine named Ronn Owens one of the 25 Greatest Talk Show Hosts of All Time. Monday, I appeared on his show for about my 100th time. The interview was an hour long and covered such topics as: When it is and isn't wise to follow your passion, the pros and cons of for-profit vs. non profit careers, and colleges that still are accepting applications for the fall. HERE is the link.

Also, on Monday, I was on WHYY (NPR-Philadelphia) for an hour questioning whether work-life balance is a goal all people should strive for. I argued that, for example, the clerk who spends workweek hours 40-50 ensuring that everyone is paid promptly should not be denigrated as a workaholic but praised as a hard worker or even a hero. I also explained why shorter hours may not address the real reason people are stressed at work. HERE is an excerpt.

Today, I was on the CBC (Canada's NPR) for an hour, also talking about the whether we are too universally extolling work-life balance and unfairly labeling hard workers with the term "workaholic." The host pretty much took the other side. I leave it to you to decide if I held my own.  HERE is the link to that hour.

And as I mentioned in the previous post, today I offered very basic job-search advice to teens on NPR's Marketplace HERE is the link.

I hope you find these audio recordings useful and maybe even vaguely entertaining.

Eight Career "Truths" That May Not Be So True

In preparation for my University of California, Berkeley Extension Public Lecture this Wednesday, I wrote a draft of what I plan to say.

HERE is the link. I'd welcome your reactions.

Also, it is a public event, so you are invited. The event is free but you're required to register.

Is Work-Life Balance Overrated?

Business Insider interviewed me about what I thought about the deified "work-life balance"

The article came out today and I was surprised and, I must admit, flattered to see that my opinion was the only one cited. Perhaps because it is contrary to conventional wisdom.

Update: I'm amazed and delighted that it's gotten 35,000 hits and 1,400 Facebook Likes. 

"California's Favorite Job Coach?"

I don't know how he determined it, but an article by the former California Employment Development Director and Milken Fellow called me "California's Favorite Job Coach." I guess I can't help but feel proud.  More important to you, I hope you'll find some of the tips I offer in that article of value.

In Praise of Work: Work-Life Balance is Overrated

Psychology Today features a weekly column, "Who's Going to be the Next Einstein."

I was flattered that the author of the column, a Duke University research scientist asked me about how to live the life well-led. HERE is the link.