Duality versus Monism

This week has been one of thought and frustration for me. Thought about what I can do to make a living here, and frustration at the difficulties that I'm facing. I wish that I had a speciality of some kind, and that I could capitalise on it. The nuts and bolts of the problem for me is that I'm a generalist, and I've done fine out of being one for my whole career. The jobs that are advertised on the mainstream recruitment web sites are all, well er....mainstream! I'm realising that I've got to carve out my own job somewhere, because the systems that 'human resource' [sic] departments use to filter applicants don't have the subtlety to see generalists as anything other than 'unsuitable'.

Part of me wants to just get a job...any job really. Another part of me realises that at 47, I'm not going to get too many more chances to change direction and that whatever I land on, is going to probably be a significant factor in my future. Our societies are driven by commerce and the pursuit of profit... and its not pretty. I'm tired of the profit motive and the holy grail of 'efficiency'. I'm tired of TV and advertising. I'm bored with the trappings of this 'life' and material things, and yet I'm unable to get away from the obligation to be a part of it. Ideally, it would be great to have a job that one could feel was in some core way a contribution to a sustainable future for our kids, rather than a continual closure of mind to the growing environmental imperative. But environmental jobs are few and far between, you have to have a doctorate in rocket science and be prepared to work for air and a wet down. Think I'm kidding? Check out this advert...one of many that I've seen recently:
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Environment Management Officer

• Passionate to ensure environment protection standards are maintained
• Problem solver?
• Effective communicator?

Working initially as part of the City Standards team, you will contribute to the environmental management of the City particularly with respect to vegetation and waterways compliance. You will also be integral to the auditing of development permit conditions requiring protection of the environment.

You will hold tertiary qualifications in the field of Environmental Management, Environmental Engineering or Environmental Studies and have experience in environmental management, solving complex issues and communicating with a wide range of people. Well developed research, analytical, organisational and project management skills are also required.

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I forgive you right now for thinking that the job is a high payer...you'd expect that it would pull some serious hitters wouldn't you? I mean 'well developed research, analytical, organisational and project management skills are also REQUIRED.!! Not 'desirable' note...but 'REQUIRED'. Go have a guess. £65k? No? Got to be at least £40k...even though its a government post....? Na...think again. This demanding post is worth precisely $44k (dollars). That's £19,246.90 thank you very much. The same skills in the commercial environment would be worth more like $75 to $95k. Still not masses, but realistic perhaps. Its not easy to make a living, but was it ever?

So, I'm seriously considering sales. The thing about sales is that you can do it off your own bat and the company that you're selling for doesn't have to take too big a risk on you because they're paying you a low base salary only, and the rest is commission. I HATE the idea of sales 'per se', partially because I think that marketeers are the spawn of the devil (sorry Bill) and the whole mess that we're in globally is largely a result of marketeers and salespeople persuading the gullible public that they need things that they really don't. I'd probably do 'OK' at it, and I'd give it my best shot, but what worries me is that I'd wake up each morning hating it a little more than i did the day before, and if I were actually able to make some decent money at it, then I'd feel torn up inside about not being able to let go of it. Does any of that make sense?

Consider this by Wendell Berry, an essayist, social critic and farmer, who finds sufficiency in the discipline of work. His immediate context is agriculture not the production of crops as much as the husbandry of the land.

"The model figure of this agriculture...." Berry writes,

“….is an old man planting a young tree that will live longer than a man, that he himself may not live to see in its first bearing. And he is planting, moreover, a tree whose worth lies beyond an conceivable market prediction. He is planting it because the good sense for doing so has been clear to men of his place and kind over generations. The practice has been continued because it is ecologically and agriculturally sound; the economic soundness of it must be assumed. While the planting of a field crop, then, may be looked upon as a ‘short-term investment’, the planting of a chestnut tree is a covenant of faith.

Nearly all old standards, which implied and required rigorous disciplines, have now been replaced by a new standard of efficiency which requires….a relentless subjection of means to immediate ends…instead of asking a man what he can do well, it asks him what he can do fast and cheap. Instead of asking a farmer to practice the best husbandry, to be a good steward and trustee of the land and his art, it puts irresistible pressures on him to produce more and more food and fibre more and more cheaply, thereby destroying the health of the land, the best traditions of husbandry and the farm population itself.”

Wendell Berry - 'The logic of sustainability'


This is where I am in my heart. I'm not afraid of hard work, just of destructive work. I'm worried about all our children's future. I'd like to do something positive, but I can't find an outlet without relative privation, and that's hard to do when others don't agree with me, or feel so certain of the future outcome of non action. Aaagh, what to do? Sell out a bit more...just a little more? No doubt I AM a romantic about this, but I cannot afford to be a romantic 'poseur' as one of my favourite authors Thoreau has been called.