I got recommended a book called "The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work"[1] today. I am unlikely to get hold of it due to a couple of adverse reviews I read, but the topic is if great interest to me. Quoting from an old blogpost of mine on the topic [2]:
<quote> [...] presumably, an order of magnitude more people who are debating this question with themselves: Is it worth it, really? (for whatever values of "it" seem reasonable to you.) Speaking for myself, I'm grappling with the question too. I went through the "live at work, define yourself by your job, burn out spectacularly" phase along with various other people during the dotcom boom; and promised myself that it wouldn't happen again. Actually being serious about that promise had various implications. Here are some: Spending only a reasonable amount of time at work implied that one would have sufficiently interesting things to do outside of work, which again meant that the constant cultivation of interesting friends and ideas was a necessity, not just a hobby. Realising that being a B player was not just not-a-bad-thing, but that there were contexts within which it was an excellent idea. <snip> And, of course, the fact that I acquired a family along the way - a wife, and then a daughter - makes the above all the more important as an internal dialogue. What is the acceptable level of trade-off? How does one define "acceptable", anyway? Interesting times (there's that word again!) So, how does everybody else deal with this? [1] http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307277259 [2] http://udhay.livejournal.com/924.html -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
