If, as some experts say, a balanced lifestyle is essential, what about those who do what they love for a living? What does this do to the balance in life? Are these happier people, ranking 7 or higher on the joy-o-meter?
”When people do what they love for a living it becomes more than a job. It`s more like a calling,” said clinical psychologist Stanley Selinger.
”They see the hard work and long hours as a kind of mission.”
Lynne Lichtenauer, executive director of the Rialto Square Theatre Corp. in Joliet, agrees. ”If I won the lottery tomorrow I would volunteer here,”
she recently declared. Lichtenauer, in fact, did volunteer for seven years doing public relations and marketing before she was hired as director in 1988.
”I started because I thought I could enhance the effort which restored the Rialto,” Lichtenauer said. She quickly became dedicated to what she calls ”the shining gem in downtown Joliet.”
Does punching a time clock directing 300 volunteers change her attitude toward her work?
Lichtenauer responds: ”Not at all. If I hadn`t been asked to become the director I would have kept on volunteering.”
Even in such an ideal situation, Selinger warns there is a danger in defining oneself too narrowly. In a slight variation on the theme of balance, Selinger, a senior staff psychologist at Humana Hospital/Michael Reese and assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Illinois/Chicago, talked about the importance of being able to ”appreciate the diversity within ourselves. There are many different ways we can define ourselves. A job is only one.
”If we rely on one thread for our self-esteem at the exclusion of many other areas, we can become very threatened by change. Additionally we may never fully reach self-satisfaction,” Selinger said.
Self-satisfaction for Lichtenauer comes in the ”simple joys of spending time with my 22-year-old son.” She also works in community theater.
For those who can`t turn play into pay, Selinger advised to be aware that the ”crush to achieve and achieve is an over-valuation of intellectual achievement at the expense of emotional achievement.”
In other words, get a hobby, get out of the house, get out of the office. ”People who are more satisfied can play and enjoy the childlike side of their lives, allowing themselves the pleasure to act like children. They can give up control and see life as a process,” Selinger added.
