M204  

Occupation & Being

Existentialism is a philosophy which explores roles, identity, and the way in which humans create a self from daily activities and occupations.  It also led to ideas regarding the acceptance of a greater sense of human responsibility for personal decisions in the face of the non-existence of God. 

I am interested in existentialist theories of identity and self, because it implies that what we do creates what we are.

The existentialist understanding of humanity is that one is responsible for creating one’s self.  Since the ‘death of God’ there is no ‘a priori’ essence, only existence.  To quote Sartre "first of all, man exists, turns up, appears on the scene, and, only afterwards, defines himself." [i] We are therefore responsible for creating our conscious experience.  But we engage in ‘bad faith’ [ii] by taking this creation too seriously, because there is nothing behind the charade.  The acceptance of a role or identity also allows us to relinquish responsibility for our actions, either by identifying with a role that allows wrongdoing, or identifying with a role that allows us to excuse ourselves from responsibility and remain passive.

In Being and Nothingness [iii] Sartre gave an example of bad faith, describing a man who performs the stereotyped role of a waiter.  Sartre writes that the waiter performs a representation, both to himself and to his customers.   But to realise this representation he also takes on the actual responsibilities, such as working unsociable hours, making the coffee, and learning other skills that allow him to represent himself as a waiter - and not as, say, a journalist.  Sartre’s point is that we can not be anything in the way that an ink well is an ink well; that we only ever play at being a waiter, and are therefore condemned to a condition of bad faith, behind which there is nothing.  Occupational Therapy and psychology would add that in addition to the role-playing by the waiter, he and other role-players would develop patterns of behaviour, habits, automatic reactions, manual skills, cognitive abilities, a focus of attention and perception, proficiency, attitudes etc, that become part of the body.  This is also a ‘common sense’ understanding.   My farming neighbour in Australia would have referred to this as becoming ‘set’ in the work, by which she meant that not only do one’s muscles become accustomed to the repetitive strain of a manual task, reducing the effort required, but the skill and speed of performance also increases with practise, and routine actions become automated, freeing our attention for more difficult tasks.  One would have to consider, as with all learning or experience, that traces are created across the body, including the brain.  If we didn’t believe this, teachers would not teach, and physiotherapists and occupational therapists would not re-train stroke or accident victims.

This implies that what one does over time leaves permanent traces.  This does not conflict with Sartre’s existentialism, though his theories seem more philosophically than physiologically based.  His discussion concerns the major pro-active decisions of life that cause emotional anguish (such as whether to join a resistance group or stay at home and look after one’s mother) [iv].  Whereas the small, reformative actions of self control (such as giving up alcohol or chocolate) are equally difficult because biologically driven, by physiological habits that have become biological needs.  It takes effort and pain to change our habits.  It is possible to re-train, take up a new career or leisure activity, lose weight, stop drinking or otherwise modify our behaviour.  But not only must one first realise that the possibility of change exists, that ‘what one is’ is not fixed and permanent as Sartre points out; one must also physically re-route those invisible (physiological) traces within the body, and change one’s perceptual focus and automatic responses.  What we do is what we are, and change is difficult to achieve.

A further point then arises, which is that we should consider it important to spend time in occupations that we prefer, so that we can develop patterns, habits and abilities that suit us.  In this way one would imagine, years down the track, the earlier experience will have allowed us to build solid foundations of capability, and one would expect to be proficient and experienced in those things most enjoyed.  If on the contrary we have developed skills in things that are not enjoyable it will be difficult to change. Not only habits, abilities and attitudes, but social status, self image, and financial context will be ‘set’.

Everyone has an 'internal relationship' with their daily occupation – whether it is a preferred one or not.