Is Work a Pleasure? Why Not!

In my several years journey, as an entrepreneur, which I believe was partly accidental, and partly, wanting to be in control, I have very often seen, that how naivety of running a business, has drawn me into trouble. How ignorance, has made me pay dearly, to recover. How, the desire or aspiration to make a difference in society, has pulled me into various avoidable situations.

Then, why do we keep doing it? Day after day, month after month, year after year, 14-16 hours a day, I am involved into doing something, which has given me, all the things I have mentioned above, and in pretty decent numbers. Then why? My family is equally concerned on this issue, as it has perhaps borne the maximum pressure for all what has happened to me, good and not so good. Today, my wife is essentially concerned about my health and whether these 16 hours, puts a pressure on my health regime.

But we keep doing it. Happily, not so happily, having fun, having difficulties, still keep pegging. So, that is why I keep telling myself, if my work extends to my pleasure time, then work must be giving that pleasure, for me, to forego everything else, and spend time on my work. I used to love going to movies, today, I don’t. I love travel, I still do, as my work takes me to different parts of the world. I enjoyed cricket all my life, and I still do, though there has been too much cricket these days, which has at times reduced the finer elements of the game, which I used to enjoy earlier. I enjoyed to be with friends. Today, that is highly restricted. It is very difficult for me to find friends, who are just “friends”. Even if they are, I find it difficult to converse, beyond a point, as the vocabulary has become restricted, and unless you link it, with cricket, or, travel, or any such thing which I enjoy doing. Why? I wonder, why can’t I have a friend, whose interests are completely different from mine, and we have nothing in common, but we could be very good friends. May be, I am seeking that today. I don’t know.

But all these lead to a simple theory perhaps. If a politician’s son joins politics, if a doctor’s son studies medicine, if a cricketer wants to spend time with cricket all his life, same perhaps is true with entrepreneurs. We continue to develop ideas, and try and monetize them, not necessarily to make money only, but also to get that belief, that your idea works. We continue to pursue opportunities relentlessly, even if it doesn’t make too much sense at times. We do. We do all these, because work to us is pleasure and we are somewhere getting maximum enjoyment, fulfillment, and happiness from it.