Networks, the work ethic and new age fluffy bunnyism
Sunday, August 23, 2009 at 11:58AM One of the joys for me of reading and much as I do, and reading so many books in rapid succession, is the way that ideas from one merge into the others. I don't almost remember as much as I wish I could but the syntheses can be great fun.
Many of the books I read on spirituality reinforce the idea that being is more important than becoming. Expecting to be happy if certain conditions are met is a false position to get into when happiness is something you do rather than something you get. To be happy is a choice, a choice that many of us, sadly, don't make.
I am currently reading Manuel Castells' fantastic book The Power of Communication. In it he talks of the global network society's tendency to truncate time and how the industrial society, with its ideas of progress, deferred gratification, Protestant work ethic etc. made becoming more important than being. In his view in the networked society "being cancels becoming".
In the industrial society, which was organised around the idea of progress and the development of productive forces, becoming structured beeing, time conformed space. In the network society, the space of flows dissolves time by disordering the sequence of events and making them simultaneous in the communication networks, plus installing society in structural ephemerality: being cancels becoming.
I find it funny in my new life as a freelancer when friends, who still work in industrial age office jobs, ask me where I am "going back to work". I am genuinely confused by the question and it is in the sense suggested by Castells, I do what I do, it is a mix of things for myself and things for other people, some of it is paid and some of it is not, I am as likely to be doing it at 4.00 in the morning as I am between 9.00 and 5.00, my wife thinks I am working harder than ever before and yet it doesn't feel like it. More than ever I have a sense of being rather than becoming.
Reader Comments (7)
Stimulating post Euan. It seems to me you describe a place without 'should's', the errors of judgement that can be heralded by expectations that can be very self-limiting and, one might ask, how appropriate are they in an age of discovery such as this one anyway? Nevertheless they can be very difficult to shake off. The distinction between becoming and being is very helpful.
This is such a thought provoking message that I've ordered Castells book from Amazon (it sounds like an easier read than Rise of the Network Society and I intend to change my life in the next six hours. I always thought my life was a quest for self actualisation and completely missed the element of time structuring and deferred gratification. Damn you, Protestant work ethic!
Seth Godin's video on Quieting the Lizard Brain finished what you started. I have done enough becoming for one incarnation, from now on, I'm being. The twentieth century is over.
Fascinating, Euan. While telling clients and prospects over and over that it's not about getting bigger but about being more authentic, I lost sight of that for myself, and fell head first into the "becoming" trap. This made everything less and less wholesome. Your post has helped in the journey back, which isn't over, but feels (now) probable rather than merely possible.
nice post Euan - being versus becoming is an interesting take.
Some people talk about being versus doing, e.g. when asked "what do you do?" they might take umbrage and claim to be a human being not a human doing.
But after thinking about this, I think it might really be a question of being versus perception, i.e. what you are versus what others think you are, or should be.
Getting too profound for a sober Sunday afternoon :-)
That is because you have found a form of true happiness, as John Stuart Mill wrote,
“Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing.”
I think you have discovered the inward forces that make you a human being. Even though you can be cussed old bugger sometimes, but I respect you for that as well ";+)
Alan
"Work is love made visible"
Another great post, Euan. Choosing to be happy, being rather than becoming is directly influenced by my profound interest in people and their stories, and how we connect with one another.
It also require a new definition of "work". As another freelancer, I am creating my own definition of work that employees do not always understand as it does not fit with their frame of reference.
At the risk of being categorised as a new age fluffy bunny, this quotation from Khalil Gibran, is a great way of expressing it for me :
"And what is it to work with love?
Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy".
- Kahlil Gibran in "The Prophet"
I love "The Prophet"