The average person will spend 90,000 hours – about 20% of their waking life – at work. The French philosopher Simone Weil calls work “part of an ever-renewing rhythm of human existence”. Work is my everyday existence. How can it also be the site of my spirituality?
According to some of the major religions, work is a crucial arena for spiritual connection. Mindful work is one of the four paths to enlightenment in Hinduism; karma yoga and Zen Buddhists consider every action a means of mujodo no taigen – actualising the Way. In Islam, finding moral and ethical ways of making a living is seen as part of worship. And then there is my aunt, a dyed-in-the-wool, country-town Catholic, who once told me that if she has to do anything unpleasant she just “offers it up” to God.
