17th
Work + Love + Play
Within the areas of you life, it has become clear to me there are three areas that require dedication to — and this dedication will give you the best chance to live a long, rewarding life. Doris Goodwin, author of Team of Rivals and other biographies of presidents, explains this concept well in relation to past presidents.
Abraham Lincoln had a deep and passionate interest in a wide range of areas, literature, the arts, but his love of politics drove his work life. When that became too stressful for him, he always had the theater to go to or a great book to delve into. Thus Lincoln’s varied interests would keep his life balanced, and in some ways helped benefit his work.
Work. This is important, of course, to find an area you can make a living in that you can use a passion for. This will help it not seem like work, but fun, and that’s a clear difference. Once you start considering it fun is when you can be truly free and creative, and then worlds open up to you. Doing well in you work life requires time, energy, talent, and passion. And those four things will take a lot out of you.
Love. Because the four work pieces take a lot from you, its all the more reason to have love in your life. Love is the support structure to make yourself right after a particularly rough round of work and put you back out there, stronger than before. Love can become the motivation for work — to provide for your family, to make a loved one proud of what you do. Without love, work seems flat and methodical. With it, its noble and heroic. You’re out there providing for your family, like a real adult. Thus, love is the core piece of the three. Without it, the others are flat. So find someone who will love you for who you are, whether its a significant other or family.
Play. Work and love are great, but they don’t always counter the work stress (and even love stress) so well. This is why you need play. You need interests outside of work, outside of love, to drive your passions and keep yourself sane. Lincoln lost himself in poetry, novels, and other works of literature. Thus this can be simple as a good piece of fiction, or something entirely different. The point is play has to be about what you love doing for you, and you have to keep it up as work gets more time-intensive.
Work + Love + Play. Seems like simple equation. But what does it equal? Contentment. A pleasure in your own existence, in the idea that you have it right. Each of the values will fluctuate; sometimes work more intensive, sometimes love, but they will all balance in the end. But if you don’t include all three, there is no equation. And no answer.
If you’re feeling like that answer isn’t there right now, try plugging yourself into that equation and see what’s missing.
