Breakfast with Socrates Chapter 4

Annie:
The chapter starts with his saying how 34% of lottery winners would stay at their jobs.  I don't think I would be one of them.  I'd want to travel, and I don't find much satisfaction in my jobs beyond the people I work with, which is a lot!  I'm not saving the world, or curing cancer, or teaching or learning anything new.  Day after day I pretty much do the same thing.  I work for the compensation, and, as I really think about it, to fill my time.  Sad, maybe, but true.  But ever since being done with college, I don't want to take 'work' home.  I don't want to worry about what needs to be done, or what I should be doing.  I felt like I could never just enjoy the moment when I was going to school.  I want work to stay at work, and home to be home.  Therefore, I haven't looked to increase my pay by increasing the requirements of me, and finding something more fulfilling.  I am sometimes plagued with 'what am I doing with my life?'  But I sometimes get paid to read, play scrabble, walk the canyon, etc., doesn't seem too bad, and also makes me think I can't ask for more compensation when I would do these things for free.

Jon:

July 4, 2011
Dear Annie,
      I’m sorry it has taken so long for me to respond to your comments on chapter 4 of Breakfast with Socrates. I had read the chapter a week or so ago and couldn’t remember much so re-read it today to provide a more articulate reaction. 
 Your feelings about your work struck home with me in more ways than one. First, it gave me a huge pang of regret that, whether student or teacher, going to school means having “home work,” work you take home with you. That bane of schooling was an albatross around my neck for all of my professional life. It seems I couldn’t leave my school work at school. I was always worried about what and how I would teach my next day’s class, which definitely interfered with my performance as a husband and father. I haven’t quizzed my colleagues, but I suspect their situation was somewhat similar. This bane of my life is paired to a benefit in terms of job satisfaction. I used to tell my students at the beginning of every semester that I had the dream job: “I would do what I’m doing now if I didn’t have to work for a living.” I then encouraged them to find a similar job situation. But as you can see, it was definitely a mixed bag—lots of pluses and minuses. If I had to do it over, I’m sure I would try to find a job I could leave at work, although I couldn’t have worked at something that was pure rote or doing something I didn’t think made a difference for good in the world, in spite of the satisfaction of liking the people I worked with and taught. Given a second chance, I certainly would have revised my priorities.

 In view of the generous portion of the estate we have inherited from Smith and Katie, I also have mixed feelings. I’m grateful that they were frugal folk. Their frugality was our fortune. Their early earning years forged a strong work ethic, but on Smith’s part, an almost draconian check on spending, which made Katie feel financially marginalized and demeaned, especially when Smith sent so much of their early meager paychecks to Lorana. I don’t know how to sort that all out, but it was unfortunate for them that he saw any discretionary spending (going out for dinner or to a movie) as profligate. Robert Rowland Smith’s emphasis on balance is important in money matters. Being careful, but also being caring, because for each of us, money means something a little bit different. Mom and I have had to compromise many times to work out our different attitudes toward money, borne of our families’ different sizes, attitudes, and practices.

Our commitment to the principle of tithing has helped immensely in resolving our differences and in ensuring our continuing solvency. My job, which I loved doing, has also been a boon to our post-retirement financial stability, with a life-time source of funds more than sufficient to do most of what we have dreamed of doing. Maybe that’s the ultimate test of job satisfaction. It keeps on giving to the end. 
 To summarize: a job should provide adequate financial security for the needs and wants of a family. It should also be a source of personal satisfaction, borne of the feeling that we’re doing something good with our skills and that in the doing, we feel we’re growing toward something better. We should be sure that we are giving a full day’s work for a full day’s pay but that, in the end, the job is always secondary to the primary duty of being a good spouse and a good parent. Striking the right balance is more than a staying upright on the
tightrope. 


Kristin: 

I really liked both of your comments. I have actually been thinking about this lately, namely "being-at-work". I have decided to stay and do this summer job at Tech Boston Academy because I figured it paid a lot, it was worth not going home for, and it would provide experience I need. However, when I woke up today I didn't want to go in and I wanted to quit right then and there. So, when I was reading the first part of the chapter, I felt that it somewhat applied to me. But, I think we often wake up and don't want to go to work (especially when it's summer). I love teaching. I do. I just don't like the disorganization that comes with secondary education. It has been a zoo these past two days and the aspects of team mentioned in the chapter could not be truer. I even noticed this in my school this past year. We were in discipline teams and had two meetings weekly. I noticed how a couple teachers did most of the work while a few others did nothing. It was easy to be a team member and do absolutely nothing. I found it ironic that we were so poor at successful teams yet when we would put our students in teams, we would give each member of a team (or group) a job so that everyone had a job to perform. We could learn from this and do the same in our meetings. I'm not at that school anymore so whatever. But at my next school, it's something that I will definitely bring up and try to cultivate. It doesn't have to be hierarchical but each team member must have a responsibility if we want to avoid overburdening the few and letting others off the hook.  
In other observations, I have noticed that a lot of the teachers I've come in contact with in Boston Public Schools have no life. Their life is teaching. They go to work early and stay late. They have no friends, no outside life, their life is their students. In fact, I was talking to a former TNYer today who is working at Tech Boston and has been for 6 years. He is Scottish and looks like the guy from Bridesmaids, the good cop...anyway, he said the same thing. All he does is work, he loves it and it's his dream job but that's it. I don't know, but I kinda don't like that. I want to have something besides just my work. It was ominous to think that my life could possibly become so one-dimensional. Dad, you made a good and vital point. We need balance. Work shouldn't be our life, even if we do love it. There's more life to be had, more experiences to have.