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Pieper Happiness & Work

There is little if any connection between happiness and work as we know it in the modern capitalist economy according to Josef Pieper in Leisure, The Basis of Culture. Without insight, silence, contemplation, and thought, Pieper argues that we do not experience leisure in our modern realm where leisure represents downtime from the battlefield of labor. In our modern social structure and culture of work, we have forgotten what the Ancient Greeks and medieval Europeans knew was necessary for the cultivation of a meaningful and happy life, real leisure “The Greeks understood and valued leisure, as did the medieval Europeans. Religion can only be born in leisure—a leisure that allows time for the contemplation of the nature of God. Leisure has been, and always will be, the first foundation of any culture” (Leisure 1).

However, Pieper argues that we live in a culture of total work in the modern era. People are defined by their jobs with their characters relegated to a secondary importance. Greatness is most often equated with economics and leisure time has come to mean only that time when one is not on the company payroll, a time when one needs rest and relaxation only so they feel like going back to work. Pieper argues that human beings cannot be fulfilled in such a work-a-day existence. Only when three conditions are met is real leisure possible to Pieper, the kind Aristotle referred to when he said one is not at leisure in order to be at leisure. One must build up property from wages, limit the power of the state, and overcome internal poverty. Instead of trying to get more leisure time through their money, most people want to get more money with it. People are not able to fulfill themselves because all they are able to achieve is becoming one more spoke in the economic wheel.

Relaxation, effortlessness, and transcendence are only attainable through leisure which is the opposite of wo

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Pieper Happiness & Work. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 01:34, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1686112.html