Part 3

The Art of Happiness at Work
by The Dalai Lama, Howard C. Cutler, M.D.

(Page 3 of 4)

He wasn't getting it. But I failed to understand why he didn't get it. The concept of work overload isn't some obscure American custom, or even something unique to Western culture. After all, the Japanese have even coined the word karoshi-death by work overload. I decided to frame it in his terms. "Well, let's say you're a young monk and you're studying and practicing Buddhism. So your teacher would be the equivalent of your boss."

"O.K., right." He nodded. "I understand."

"And your job is to learn and memorize certain texts, so let's say your boss gives you a text that you need to memorize by next week. It's a very challenging text. Now, if you work hard, maybe you can memorize it by next week, but it's going to be very difficult. Then he comes back a few hours later and says, 'Well, now you have to memorize an additional text along with this text in the same amount of time.' And he's your boss-you can't just say, 'I'm going to quit, I'm not going to be a monk anymore.' So, work overload in this context means that you are given more and more to do but not enough time to do it."

"Oh, now I think I understand. For example, when I was around twenty, in Tibet, I had to give an important teaching, and for preparation I had homework early morning and late evening. Then I had to get up very early before my attendants arrived and even when my attendants had left, late into the evening I had to read and memorize. So I woke up a few hours earlier and went to bed a few hours later-that is the kind of overload?"

"Right."

"But then this is something that with extra attention and energy, it's something I could achieve. And that was O.K. for the short term. But if I were to continue with this having less sleep for a long time, having that kind of overload for a whole year, then it would be impossible."

"But that's the kind of thing many people are faced with these days," I informed him.

"So why can't these people say 'I can't do this' right from the beginning?" he asked. "Do they get fired?"

"In many cases, yes."

"In that case I think it goes back to knowing one's limitations. And if a boss gives more work to do and it is beyond their capacity, then I think they have to say something. They have to say 'This is too much work for me' and talk to the boss and try to reduce it. If that doesn't work, then they may need to look for new work.

"However, at that point let's say that the boss agrees to extra pay, and the employee agrees, then that is a person's decision and there's no cause to complain about overload. But if the boss gives too much work without increase of salary, then this 'overload' is just exploitation, the kind that we just spoke about.

"But I think in these kinds of situations, the employer has a responsibility to judge how much a person can reasonably be expected to do. Too much overload is simply a lack of concern, lack of respect. Even overloading an animal is disrespectful to that life-so, that's exploitation, it's unfair," he said with a resolute tone.

"I'm glad that you mentioned the issue of unfairness," I replied, "because that is another of the sources of workplace dissatisfaction. In fact, I think we're touching upon some of the most common sources of dissatisfaction at the workplace.

"In today's workplace environment, there's often a focus solely on production, productivity-produce, produce, produce. Now, this may be changing slowly, with more companies paying attention to creating a more humane environment, but in many cases the organization doesn't care about the personal welfare of the employees, or the inner state or satisfaction of the workers-all it cares about is the bottom line, making a bigger profit, keeping the share prices high. And this type of environment creates the conditions for all kinds of inequities, unfairness, stress for the employees, and so on. In view of that, how can we maintain a feeling of calmness and inner satisfaction in an environment that is focused only on production and profit?"

The Dalai Lama laughed. "Howard, some of your questions are so impossible! It is almost as if you are asking, 'How can beings in the hell realm learn to practice patience, tolerance, and tranquility?'

"There are not always easy answers. In modern society, you find many examples of unfairness-for example, corrupt leaders giving jobs or promotions to relatives instead of based on merit. These things are plenty. Now here, it's difficult to get satisfaction. How to deal with these things? That's a problem. Like in the Tibetan case, we're honest, we're not anti-Chinese, but the Chinese falsely accuse us of things and engage in bullying tactics in Tibet. Under those circumstances, legally they are wrong, we are right, but still we suffer. We're defeated. Under those circumstances, trying to get some satisfaction or some kind of peace of mind, now that's hard work.

"Millions of people are subjected to various forms of unfairness, isn't it? We need to fight against injustice outwardly, but at the same time we have to find ways to cope inwardly, ways to train our minds to remain calm and not develop frustration, hatred, or despair. That's the only solution. We may find help from our belief systems, whether we believe in karma or in God, but we can also use our human intelligence to analyze the situation and to see it from a different perspective. That will help," he said with conviction.

Referring to our many conversations over the years, I continued, "In the past, we've often spoken of training the mind as the key to happiness, and that one way to train our minds is to use our human intelligence, to use human reason and analysis to reshape our attitudes and outlook. In fact, this is a process which you've called 'analytic meditation.'"

"That's right," said the Dalai Lama.

"So, I'm wondering if you can take me through a specific example of this process. Let's say that we're going for a promotion at work, and we didn't get it. We're feeling really upset, we're feeling that it's unfair or we're jealous of the person who got the promotion. How do we deal with that?"

He replied thoughtfully, "It begins by deliberately analyzing whether responding with anger or jealousy, for instance, will benefit us or harm us in the long run. We have to deeply reflect on whether responding in this way brings a happier and more peaceful state of mind, or if those emotions serve to make us more unhappy. And we need to relate it to our own past experiences, thinking about the effect that these emotions have on our physical health, as well as our mental state. Think about times when you felt strong jealousy or hatred in the past and find out whether it made your life more satisfying or helped you achieve your goals. Think about how others responded to you when you were showing strong anger or jealousy, and analyze whether that helped you to have better relationships. So, think about these things until you are fully convinced of how damaging it is to ourselves to constantly respond to situations with hostility or jealousy, and how beneficial are the positive emotions like tolerance or contentment."

"O.K. Let's say that I'm convinced that it's destructive. Then what?"

"So, you are going for a new job or promotion, and you have the right qualifications, and you are worthy, but you didn't get the job. First you think, Yes, I deserved that job, but if you didn't get it you have a choice of how you will respond. You can be resentful and angry, but then you can think about how destructive that kind of mental state can be. That conviction alone will serve to make you more cautious of these emotions, and may reduce them a bit. So, don't keep thinking about the work you don't have. There will always be better jobs that you don't have. Don't continue to feel competitive or jealous. That only brings more worry, more dissatisfaction.

"But you still need a way to bring some kind of peace of mind. Here's where we need to use our capacity for critical thinking, for analysis. You begin by realizing that no situation is one hundred percent good or one hundred percent bad. Sometimes, particularly in the West, I've noticed a tendency to think in black-or-white terms. But in reality everything in life is relative. So, based on this reality, you can cultivate a wider perspective of the situation and try to see different angles. You can further analyze, realizing that with the better work and more money, that doesn't mean that you would have no problems. Some other jobs may have higher pay, but they come at a price, maybe longer hours or more responsibility and maybe risk of injury or other kinds of problems. In fact, if you really look at others in the higher positions, you may discover that there may be more demands, there may be more competition or jealousy from others. You might discover, for instance, that while your current work pays less, it may be easier in some ways, or even less dangerous in some instances.

"So, you continue to think about the reality, thinking, Oh, yes that's my bad luck, I deserve that better job, but since that didn't happen, instead of looking only at the lack of the better job, you could cultivate a wider perspective and see it from the other direction where you can think, Well, yes, this may pay less and is not the best work, but since with this work I earn enough, a sufficient amount for my family and for my survival, I'm happy. It's O.K. So, thinking along these lines, we can build contentment with our job even when things don't go our way."

Copyright © 2003 the Dalai Lama & Howard C. Cutler, published by Riverhead Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., all rights reserved, reprinted with permission from the publisher.

About the Author

Recognized at the age of two as the reincarnation of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso was brought to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, and enthroned two years later as the fourteenth Dalai Lama. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, His Holiness is today universally acknowledged as one of the world's preeminent spiritual leaders.

Howard Cutler, M.D., is a diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. He first met the Dalai Lama in 1982, while visiting India on a research grant to study Tibetan medicine. Dr. Cutler maintains a private psychiatric practice in Phoenix.