Love is all the workplace needs

I was facilitating for a team this past week and in a conversation about workplace boundaries I presented this quote,

“Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” – Prentis Hemphill

And depending on your relationship with love and your relationship to what love means, you may find that the angle with which this quote hits you comforts or stings. For many of my clients this is a comfort. Because you see, the word “love” through a singular word in the English language, actually has numerous meanings with distinct nuance.

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Eros (sexual passion)

Philia (deep friendship)

Ludus (playful love)

Agape (love for everyone)

Pragma (longstanding love)

Philautia (love of the self)

Storge (family love)

Mania (obsessive love)

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So for all my HR police out there who are telling employees that love is not appropriate for the workplace, I have one question for you. What kind of love are you talking about? And what about that love has you so shook?

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I would hope that in a working world that seems to extol the idea of “work-life balance” we would have room to consider how agape is part of that equation. How philautia and self-love is necessarily part of the equation. Because when employees stop loving themselves (philautia) as much as they love their job (mania) the result is burnout. And no, that’s not an expression of love.

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In fact, according to the National Library of Medicine, burnout is a psychological disorder resulting from emotional fatigue and utter exhaustion stemming from (among other things) poor interpersonal dynamics with people in the workplace. Yep, I know you already know which people are burning your candle from top to bottom.

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So if the people at work are exhausting us, what are we to do?

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The 2023 Gallup State of the Workplace shows, yet again, that wellbeing is on the decline, loneliness is up, and the workplace plays a huge role in our overall life satisfaction (duh).

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The wellbeing industry has exploded in the last 4 years. Eat better, rest more, exercise, take a trip, get a therapist . . .everyone is desperate to feel better. And while grassroots liberatory movements like The Nap Ministry and Collective Rest and Room to Breathe have been cropping up in PGM communities for women and LGBTQ folks especially, to help humans remember to check in and take care, the quality that these retreat advocates possess that is largely missing from the Corporate machine is a careful reexamination of the self in relationship to love.

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Same word. 8 meanings.

It’s like that duck that’s also a rabbit. You can choose to see things in a different way. Just try. Now, at work.

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When you see this quote, what meaning do you choose to see?

“Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” – Prentis Hemphill

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I’m not saying that it’s wrong, I’m just wondering if you can be willing to see something different, and maybe find love at work. At least for yourself if not for your colleagues, though if you can love your colleagues, the team will definitely be better for it. Because I thought Donna from HR wanted us to take advantage of our EAP budget, use our sick days, and tell our managers that we don’t respond to emails on the weekends and then praise us when we . . .don’t answer emails on the weekend. Is that not love? Or do you call it boundaries? What about when you tilt your head to the side?

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At a recent DEI Conference in Raleigh, NC, I had the pleasure of hearing former Ben & Jerry’s CEO, Matthew McCarthy give the keynote address. It was white boy summer to hear him tell a room full of business leaders that propagating the idea of work-life balance was the same as promoting zero sum bias. The key to work-life balance isn’t trying to create strict rules where one cannot bleed into the other. That exercise is futile and any number of caretakers anywhere in the world will enlighten you if you disagree. The life you live doesn’t fit into neat little boxes any easier than your identity does. “We are in a time of awakenings”, McCarthy told the conference guests, “have the courage to be constructively dissatisfied”.

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The key to surviving the workplace is boundaries. And boundaries are the way me loving myself and me loving humanity don’t have to be at odds with each other on some whacked out seesaw where my lows equal others’ highs. Remember when they go low, we go high, just leaves us super emotionally drained. Instead, we have to be willing to say, “these emotionally stunted, lopsided work relationships are making me sad, lonely, and unbelievably tired.” (And you know there are 7 kinds of tired right?)

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So, if we want to thrive in the workplace, we have to create spaces where there’s room for nuance and the multidimensional capacity inherent in all things but most importantly love; for us to live and love ourselves as individuals and as a community . . . at the same damn time.

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