Work or Die

"Rast Ich, so rost Ich!"

---German Proverb (If I rest, I will rust.)

Did you ever wonder why some people make it a point to keep themselves busy all day, all the time? I'm not referring to the people who have lots of work to do, like a company CEO for example. Or people who need to work 2 jobs just to make ends meet. These folks are legitimately busy.

I'm referring to the people who create EXTRA work for themselves for the purpose of keeping themselves pre-occupied. I'm not talking about the slackers who need to appear that they are extraordinarily busy. I'm not referring to 'busywork', which sometimes involves having some sort of superfluous job handed to you by a boss; rendering you a helpless victim to the confines of the 'laborious crap' at hand.

So, busywork is not the problem---its the self-imposed irrelevant preoccupations that can get you in trouble.

Call it busywork or killing time or self-imposed irrelevant preoccupations, no matter how you slice it, there are very few benefits. Companies can be bled of profits, employees can lose their motivation and critical objectives can be left unattended because a person is focused on appearing to be busy.

"If I rest, I will rust" is not so much a problem for the younger generations. Younger employees are motivated by youth and a hunger to learn, grow, develop, succeed and move on to the next 'gig'. Although the younger generations have been known to 'look' busy now and then. But, Resting and Rusting impacts the older folks in the workforce--for many obvious and some not-so-obvious reasons. The primary motivator is DEATH. And, as Tennyson, wrote, perhaps worse than death is living an unaccomplished life: "How dull it is to pause, to make an end. To rust unburnished, not to shine in use." Yes, an inability to contribute, a feeling of being unneeded or unnecessary is, in the minds of many, a death sentence. Here's how the thought process and fears unfold:

1) Fear of physical stagnation and decline. "If I stop moving, my health will fail me."

2) Fear of a decrease in mental acuity. "If I stop thinking, my brain will fail me."

3) Fear of not being needed. "If I am not busy, I am not needed."

4) Fear of death. "If I stop contributing, I will have no value and will die."

These are legitimate fears and concerns, but filling time with irrelevant minutiae is NOT the way to subside them.

Here's a real life example:

Jeff was a baby-boomer, aged 61 when he started making serious plans about his retirement date. He started to get extremely nervous about the prospect of calling it quits because his job was 'who he was'---his entire life had been dedicated to his career. He was worried about what waited for him on the other side of retirement---where and how would he find his value as a person?

One day, Jeff started coming into work at 5am and left the office around 8pm. He helped the custodial staff empty wastebaskets, dust desks and water the plants before dawn. During the day, he would pick up litter outside, clear messy cafeteria tables, hang out with the union physical plant guys and try to help them change lightbulbs, paint or fix a broken boiler or chiller. This behavior lasted 4 months before anyone really noticed. During this time, Jeff felt great, he was physically active, engaged in many different tasks and most of all, he was contributing to the company in many ways.

He felt alive and necessary!!

As mentioned, it took 4 months for someone to take notice of Jeff's ambitious but self-imposed irrelevant preoccupations. The cleaning crews, the union workers, the cafeteria employees complained that Jeff was 'getting in the way' with his intrusive, irrelevant preoccupations. Just doing work for the sake of doing something disrupted the plans, processes and operations that these groups already had in place. They wanted to be nice to him and didn't want to hurt his feelings, but he made them nervous and uneasy with his incessant 'busyness'.

In addition to that, Jeff's boss noticed a decline in the productivity of his 'desk job'--reports were late and generally sloppy. Jeff's lack of attention to detail and his trouble with meddling in other people's business earned him an early retirement package. The company couldn't keep him around any longer---he had been too inefficient and they saw his behavior as a harbinger of other inefficient problems to come. Jeff was given a nice retirement package, 4 years before he wanted to leave.

That was on a dark & dreary Friday afternoon in November. Saturday morning, Jeff died in his sleep.

If Jeff hadn't been preoccupied and obsessed with keeping busy just for the sake of keeping busy, could his fate had been any different? Maybe.

The point is this: whether you're a slacker just trying to appear necessary or you're at the end of your career just trying to ward off fears of being unnecessary---self-imposed irrelevant preoccupations will ruin your plans everytime.