The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship

The essential understanding is that although work can so easily become a prison, if we follow that essential light which feels at times as if it was born with us and accompanies us on our way, there can be a way out of those shades of the prison house that begin to close upon the growing boy or girl.

All of our great contemplative traditions advocate the necessity for silence in an individual life: first, for gaining a sense of discernment amid the noise and haste, second, as a basic building block of individual happiness, and third, to let this other all-seeing identity come to life and find its voice inside us.

The understanding of this book is that in the deeper, unspoken realms of the human psyche, work and life are not separate things and therefore cannot be balanced against each other except to create further trouble.

The interesting thing about a work life is that it is very much like a workday. Most of the hard work is done by simply turning up, facing the task at hand and moving forward, inch by inch, foot by foot, until we look around, admittedly after a much greater time than we expected, but surprised to see it has all been done.

one of the abiding themes of this book—that many of the hopes we hold for a particular marriage are never consummated in the way we originally imagined.

when advertised for sale, they are always worn in situations of extreme timelessness—climbing a rock face, flying a plane, sitting with your son—as if by their purchase we will be absolved of time and no longer besieged by its swift, uncaring passage.

Neglecting this internal marriage, we can easily make ourselves a hostage to the externals of work and the demands of relationship. We find ourselves unable to move in these outer marriages because we have no inner foundation from which to step out with a firm persuasion. It is as if, absent a loving relationship with this inner representation of o

The main premise of the book becomes also its final conclusion: We should stop thinking in terms of work-life balance. Work-life balance is a concept that has us simply lashing ourselves on the back and working too hard in each of the three commitments. In the ensuing exhaustion we ultimately give up on one or more of them to gain an easier life.

Like marriage and relationship, work is a constant invisible question, sometimes nagging, sometimes cajoling, sometimes emboldening me; at its best beckoning me to follow a particular star to which I belong.