Selling out.

We have all got to find something to do for a living and when you get right down to it we only have two choices really: goods or services. Everyone has to sell something to someone else in order to make a living. Lawyers provide legal service, doctors provide medical service, and ministers provide spiritual service. Construction workers provide construction services, educators provide educational services and so on; you get the idea. So while many are selling a service you may not otherwise be able to do or want to provide for yourself, others still are actually selling something tangible you can feel in exchange for your money. As human laborers we really only have two choices as to what type of sales we want to be in, but any way you slice it, we’re all salesman (except maybe fireman, law enforcement and those in the military).

To a certain extent, this can be sort of a letdown. You grow up being told by your parents and in school, you can be anything you want to be. Most of us will spend between twelve and twenty years in pursuit of an occupation and for many the arrival there is not as enjoyable as the journey. Each of us must ultimately ask only one question though with regards to occupation.

Does what we do to make money define who we are as people?

We spend maybe half of our life laboring, but is labor the defining element of who we really are? I’d hope we are more than our jobs, but think about how when you meet someone for the first time how quickly and how pervasive the topic of work is in our conversation and this isn’t to say that there is something wrong with talking about work. But who are we really?

We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are valued not for what they are but for what they do or what they have - for their usefulness. -Thomas Merton