Between Working and Living
This book is the fifth in the six-book Balance series: Measure · The Human · Breaking · Meaning · Life · Center. The books refer to one another; it is best to read them in order.
Producing and burning out
Through four books we walked from the heavens to the heart, and from the heart to the subtleties of Sufism. This book comes down into the street. To the morning alarm, the workplace, the kitchen, the phone screen. Because a truth remains an idea until it is tested within everyday life.
The human being was created to produce. Making something, finishing something, seeing a work come from one's own hands does a person good. Our Prophet praises labor like this:
No one has ever eaten food better than what he ate from the labor of his own hands. The prophet of Allah, David, also ate from the labor of his own hands.
al-Bukhari, Buyu' 15
But the line between producing and burning out is thin. In 2019 the World Health Organization defined "burnout syndrome" as an occupational phenomenon arising from workplace stress that has not been managed: exhaustion, distance from one's work, and a sense of inadequacy. These are not a disease but the symptoms of a lack of measure.
We made your sleep a rest. We made the night a covering. And We made the day a time for livelihood.
An-Naba 78:9–11 (meaning)
In the verse, sleep, night, and day are counted side by side. Work is a blessing; so is rest. The one who sacrifices one for the other loses both. The person who works at night as by day, after a while, lives even his days in darkness.
The price of success
Success demands a price. Effort, time, other things given up. Nothing happens without this price being paid. The question is not whether the price is paid, but who pays it.
Sometimes a person's health pays the price of success. Sometimes his family: the empty chair at dinner, the face not seen at the school performance. And sometimes the person himself pays: when he reaches the goal, he realizes he has lost who he was on the way there.
In the book Breaking we spoke of the regrets of the deathbed. The list included "I wish I had not worked so hard." No one on their deathbed was saying, "If only I had put in a little more overtime."
Seek, through what Allah has given you, the home of the hereafter; and do not forget your share of this world.
Al-Qasas 28:77 (meaning)
This verse comes from advice given to Korah, Qarun. To Qarun, the keys of whose treasures a strong band could barely carry. The advice does not reject the world: Do not forget your share, it says. But a share has a measure. A share is the portion that falls to a person. Not the whole.
The difference between productivity and being human
One of the most beloved words of our age is productivity. More work in less time. Faster, more, more measurable. We carry devices that count our hours, our steps, our sleep.
The philosopher Byung-Chul Han, in his book "The Burnout Society," describes today's human being as an "achievement-subject." According to him, in the past a master from outside made a person work. Today the person is his own master and exploits himself without pause. Prohibitions have been replaced by "you can." And "you can" in the end turns into "you must."
Productivity is the measure of machines. The more a machine produces, the better it is. But the human being is not a machine. A person's worth is measured not by what he produces, but by what he is. An unproductive evening spent with a friend, a needless game played with a child, an hour spent looking at the sky doing nothing. These do not enter the productivity chart, yet they are what make a human being human.
When you have finished one task, set to another at once. And turn to your Lord alone.
Al-Inshirah 94:7–8 (meaning)
The verse praises diligence, but right after it shows the direction. Moving from task to task should be not an escape but a journey. Whatever work you do, let your direction stay the same. The balance between working and living is not losing your direction within the work.