The following story is true, although I’m sure some might not believe it. It concerns Arthur Winston who, at 90, was named by President Clinton “Employee of the Century” for his tremendous work ethic. The Department of Labor said he was the most reliable worker they ever came across. An employee of the Los Angeles Metropolitan Authority for 76 years of his 79-year career, he never came late to work or left early, taking only one sick day in three-quarters of a century, and that was to attend his wife’s funeral. He retired on his 100 th birthday.
Sadly, he died three weeks later. Perhaps what helped this remarkable man live and work so long was that his work gave him a deep sense of purpose. His health was remarkable, as evidenced by his absence of just one day in 79 years. How else to explain his death so soon after he stopped working? The longevity of his career speaks volumes about the importance of purpose in life. He no doubt would have understood the following story attributed to Osho, the Indian guru.
A man dreams that upon his arrival at a celestial plane, an attendant informs him anything he desires will instantly manifest. The man asks for a meal and the attendant instantaneously creates a sumptuous feast. The man asks for entertainment and the attendant immediately conjures up actors and musicians to amuse him. He expresses sensual yearning and beautiful women are instantly manifested to indulge his sexual fantasies. Although he is initially fascinated with his experience, after a few days the man becomes bored and asks the attendant if he can provide some work for him to do. The attendant politely informs him that he can give the man anything he wants except purposeful activity. The man replies, “I cannot spend all my time without something useful to do. I might as well be in Hell!” To which the attendant says, “Where do you think you are?” John D. Rockefeller, founder of his family empire, said, “I can think of nothing less pleasurable than a life devoted to pleasure.” The captain of industry expressed the need for meaningful work. Tolstoy did, too: “The happiness of men consists in life. And life is in labor.” No doubt, Mr. Winston found love in work and with colleagues. Thomas Edison wrote, “I never did a day’s work in my life. It was all fun.” Pulitzer and Nobel Prize winner Pearl Buck wrote, “To find joy in work is to discover the fountain of youth.”
George Bernard Shaw wrote:
A master in the art of living knows no sharp distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself he always seems to be doing both.
To Mr. Winston’s list of work, love and fun, we can add play. It’s no wonder our centenarian died after giving up his career. Lest you think I’m suggesting that you work till you drop, let me clarify two key points:
Find work you love, or learn to love work you do.
Cultivate other interests outside of work, so when you retire, you still have those things that you love and that keep you young as you continue to do them.
Kahlil Gibran, author of the best-selling “The Prophet,” wrote, “Work is love made visible.” Freud echoed: “Love and work are the cornerstones of our humanness.” So if you want to build a happy life, there’s nothing quite like erecting such cornerstones. Joseph Campbell, the great mythologist known for the maxim, “Follow your bliss,” understood that life’s deepest purpose wasn’t about finding something intellectual, but awakening higher consciousness. He wrote, “I don’t believe people are looking for the meaning of life as much as they are looking for the experience of being alive.” A similar idea was echoed by Dutch theosophist Jacobus Johannes van der Leeuw, who wrote, “The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.”
