Improving Our Relationship To Work

The Philosophy of Caveday

It’s a slightly unusual way to think about what spend most of our time doing, but we all have a relationship to work. This relationship might be functional or dysfunctional, but it works much the same as a relationship to someone else. In a person-to-person relationship, there is some sort of exchange– we give time and energy and commit to this person. In exchange, we hope to receive love and value, identity and trust. The same applies to work. In a functional relationship, we give our time and effort, hoping in exchange, to receive identity, learning, value, salary, time off…

In David Whyte’s book “The Three Marriages” he introduces a new concept that refutes the oversimplicity of “work-life balance.” His idea is that we have three relationships in our lives. The first to our social circles and our partners– to other people. The second to ourselves. And the third, to our work.

These relationships are not in equal balance in time, effort and value– it’s not just 8 hours of work, 8 for socializing and 8 for sleep and self-care. Instead, he presents that they’re interconnected and interdependent. That if I have a dysfunctional relationship with one of them, it’s impossible to have a functional relationship with the other two. Each one serves and is served by the other two.

Our 3 relationships

For example, if we have a dysfunctional relationship with work– working non-stop and giving and giving and giving to my work without getting the kind of breaks and rewards I need–it’s going to be hard to be a good partner or friend. And it’s likely that we don’t have time for proper eating, sleeping, exercise, or other self-care.

This dysfunctional relationship to work happens because it bleeds into the rest of our lives. Our work takes over for two reasons.

1. Poor boundaries. We work in the same places we take breaks and it can be confusing if our couch or kitchen table or bed are places of work or places of rest.

2. Guilt. When we don’t accomplish “enough” during the day, it feels like we should continue to work into the night and weekends (whatever “enough” actually means, because we don’t typically define it for ourselves). Instead, we could feel more accomplished every day if we spent the time learning to focus.

Deep work is a habit, not a skill. And if we practice that habit, we can get more done in less time. Wwe can confidently shut our computers at reasonable hours and have time for the other relationships in our lives.

Our mission at Caveday is to improve your relationship to work.

By improving the quality of our work,
we can improve the quality of our lives.

See for yourself how you can improve your quality of life, just by improving your quality of work with Caveday.

See the schedule here and join us in the Cave.

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Caveday is a company aimed at improving your relationship to work. We write regular posts on Medium and send out monthly Newsletters with productivity tips, life hacks, and recommendations. Sign up for the mailing list here.

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