From Arthur C. Brooks’ The Meaning of Your Life:
My psychologist friend said something else that proved revolutionary for my thinking—and, in fact, my whole life: to give a great deal to one person is even more empowering than to give a little to a lot of people. In other words, making a big, tangible difference to one person’s life has a much greater meaning-creating self-transcendent effect than writing checks to a bunch of charities (as worthwhile as that is). This is an ancient idea; it is written in the Mishnah Sanhedrin section of the Jewish Talmud, for example, that “he who saves a single soul saves a whole world.”
Randomly writing on the internet aside, finding ways to be involved with individuals (family, community, education, and mentorship) are real paths to fulfilling variety.
The lowest level of work motivation is “necessary evil.” Finding meaning in work that you hate is difficult. In fact, if you hate your job, it can inhibit a sense of your life’s meaning. Above this is work as a duty, such as that which you do to be a productive citizen and to support those you love. Fulfilling a duty is, of course, meaningful. My family is meaningful to me, and thus, so is supporting them. However, ideally you can do better than just that, by seeing your work as a means to practice excellence and virtue—that is, honing your craft. Even higher in meaning is service to others, beyond just economic support.
Even when the job isn’t perfect or is just a temporary step on a longer journey, approaching it with the Craftsman’s Mentality makes it better. Striving and excellence have positive echoes.
Psychologists have studied this mysterious sense of calling in depth and often say that it requires having a “subjective career,” as opposed to an “objective career.” The difference between the two is how success is defined. Objective careers focus on money, power, and prestige. Subjective careers are more focused on earned success and service to others. Earned success is the opposite of an old idea in psychology called “learned helplessness,” which is what occurs when people feel like no matter what they do, their rewards or punishments aren’t affected. For example, you are paid and promoted the same as everyone else, regardless of how you perform. Alternatively, you are not rewarded or are treated poorly even when you excel in your work. This leads to feelings of resignation, futility and, often, depression about life in general.
I appreciate the conception of a “subjective career” and “earned success” over “learned helplessness.” When we think of bad places to work and bad cultures, it is where democracy or fairness have been subverted in favor of sameness, where A players and C players are equivalent (or, even worse, when the willing are coopted to do do do because their yes-nature is exploited until burnout and the sloths and dishonest are tolerated).
Earned success means being recognized and rewarded for merit and personal responsibility. I work a lot with companies seeking to bring more meaning and happiness to the workplace, and one of the things I stress the most is this idea of earned success through honest, clear, merit-based systems. This is hard for weak leaders, who don’t like holding people accountable or acknowledging that aptitude and work effort differ between people and some are more excellent than others. To avoid conflict, these leaders prefer tenure- or loyalty-based systems, which strip work of meaning and drive away good people.
Holding people accountable is actually extremely hard, which is why it’s so often just not done except for either egregious cases or petty reasons. Dr. Death practiced medicine for years. Fairness does not equal sameness. The apathetic management style—low expectations and low support—may often be an understandable reaction to the real world, but it also further hollows out organizations and leads to a disengaged and unresilient workforce.
The point is that you can look for your calling without being a lifesaving paramedic or feeding the hungry. Simply being a great team member, a kind coworker, a considerate and caring manager, all count. Serving others doesn’t have to be heroic to achieve self-transcendence and the sense of meaning you crave. Even if your job is not extrinsically rewarding, you can start generating your own intrinsic rewards.
I still don’t like the idea of a calling. I think what Brooks refers to as a calling is really mostly a good attitude. But, a good attitude is also the greatest gift you can give yourself. It’s also one you can easily take away, and one that—for most of us—requires practice giving again and again.