If you see your work as only a job, then it's dragging you away from what you really want to be doing. If you see it as a calling, then it is no longer a toiling sacrifice. Instead, it becomes an expression of you, a part of you.
Victor is a motorman for the Chicago Transit Authority. Five days a week he's running an elevated train on the Red Line. Victor stands out in the minds of the people who ride his train
because of a notable and unusual trait: he loves his job. "Thank you for riding with me this evening on Electric Avenue. Don't lean against the doors, I don't want to lose you," he tells passengers over the intercom as the train departs.
As the train makes its way north, Victor points out notable sites, including which connecting buses are waiting in the street below.
People compliment him all the time, telling the city he's the best motorman in Chicago. Victor admits, "Our equipment may be junky, but for $1.50 I want to give a Lincoln Town Car ride."
Why does Victor have such a positive approach to his job? "My father is a retired motorman, and one day he took me to work with him and I was so impressed looking out that window," he says, speaking of the city skyline. "Ever since I was five years old, I knew I wanted to run the trains."
In research on working women, researchers found that even for those working in the same kinds of jobs, work was alternatively viewed either as a series of hassles or as a positive experience in which the women were in control of their lives. Among those who felt control, life satisfaction was 28 percent higher than among those who did not.
Thakar and Misra 1995
0 comments:
Post a Comment