Everywhere I go, I see books or websites or tv shows focusing on organization in the workplace. A google search of chaotic jobs turned up responses such as "organizing a chaotic workspace" or "focusing on your career in a disorganized work environment." There is one problem with this... I like chaos. I like unpredictability. I have always thrive when there is an urgent situation to be dealt with, when the line at the counter reaches to the back of the store, when the $#!& has already hit the fan and the wallpaper is now a suspicious shade of brown. I love that rush. I love the freedom that follows, when the hierarchy and bureaucracy vanish and the boss says "I don't care how, just deal with it".
Ever since I was a wee kid, I, like Truman from the Jim Carrey Film, dreamt of being an explorer, or a mercenary, or a freelance journalist in a wartorn country. Excitement, self-determination, getting by on your own wits. I was bored in school, having to sit still while this boring person droned on about why exactly we'd need to learn equations for averages, and saying that "We'd need them when we grow up" (I actually have had a use for some. I used math to cheat in biology lab to avoid counting every single kernel on an ear of corn, heh heh). Some of us wanted practical reasons. Some, myself included, would have rather been at recess or investigating the school basement. Some were happy to sit there and do their busywork. As a result of my desire to be elsewhere and to learn by doing, I was dragged before the school counselor and diagnosed with ADHD.
And yeah, I was a hyperactive kid. Running around the house, exploring the woods around the Abbey, building epic-sized lincoln log forts, I was always bolting here and there, and I never took anybody's word for anything until I tried it, even when it hurt. I miss those days.
However, kids like myself are considered to be aberrations in today's world. We are called ill. We are called unstable, or erratic. Two centuries ago, folks like I was as a child could be seen hunting beaver on the western frontier, or marching to some back asswards corner of the British Empire for trade. For the orderly among us, there were jobs such as being a banker or a grocer. Those with "wanderlust" could be seen doing the impossible, pushing boundaries, and being celebrated for it.
I look back at some of these great explorers. I read that a great many of them were depressed, or suicidal, back home, but they found a new life, a second wind, in a career as an adventurer. And I look about at the miserable people in today's world, and I see the same problem. Work is a chore, our lives are pre-planned and free from passion (When I was twelve, my father told me to start thinking about getting a 401K. Seriously.), there are few surprises, and one day is the exact same as the next. If we have something we're passionate about, say forestry or philosophy, we're told to change majors, as there's "no money in those jobs". Personally, I can tell you that I'd happily live in a shack eating ramen for the rest of my natural born life if it meant not squandering that life in some cubicle in some corner of some sterile office.
I have depression. These days, it is difficult for me to do much of anything when the depression takes hold. I do what I can to hold it back, whether it's smoking or meditation or eating healthier. A couple of days a week, however, the fog lifts. I am the kid I used to be, and I go camping when I want to, hiking when I want to, and finding new places and doing new things. Weekends are amazing for this. The happiness feeds off of doing what I love, and then Monday comes, and with the grind comes the boredom, the depression, the anhedonia. I can't help but wonder... Is this why so many are depressed? Is it because we are naturally chaotic individuals, packed into offices and classrooms like sardines? Perhaps. I'm no psychiatrist. Of course, I'm not so sure they've got it right either. After all, they tell me I need structure in every moment of my life, that I need a daily planner, and I need to stick to it, yet that's the very kind of thing that stifles me. It increases my productivity, by our reckoning, but what is productivity when compared to happiness?
Maybe I'm on to something. Maybe many of us need to rethink our lives. Maybe I'm nuts. I dunno. All I do know, is that as a chaotic individual, a hyperorganized, modern life is stifling.
29 Apr 2013, 2:43 pm
