THE REAL AND THE FALSE REWARDS
Living can be looked at in six fundamental spheres: loving, friendship, learning, work, idealism and a private life (a term I use to include leisure, recreation and times when one is alone).
Those spheres can overlap, for instance when one’s work is of a clearly idealistic nature. Nevertheless, there are real and false rewards distinctive to each of those six spheres of living. When my helping efforts were successful, an idea of such real and false rewards became clear.
For when a person gets a clear idea of what one ought to be getting out of a given pursuit and goes about getting that, he or she becomes filled with a great new enthusiasm for that aspect of his or her living. One sees it as meaningful. One talks, for example, about meaningful work, meaningful studies, a meaningful marriage, a meaningful friendship. One knows exactly how that feels. Meaning conveys an idea of living that is rich, rewarding and wonderful. That kind of reward in any one of the six spheres of living could sustain a person throughout an entire lifetime. That reward is part and parcel of the best of living.
In contrast, it is not at all difficult to understand what a person means when he or she speaks about meaninglessness in such areas as work, studies, marriage or friendship. Meaninglessness conveys an idea of living that is empty, devoid of real reward and of any wonder. One’s living is experienced as superficial. The rewards one gets out of those pursuits are at best only
-117-
