Putting the "love" back in the advice to "do what you love"

For a moment a few months back the internet pondered anew the advice to "do what you love." Miya Tokumitsu argued in Jacobin that "do what you love" is a "worldview that disguises its elitism as noble self-regard." Slate reprinted the article; the New York Times blog The Stone picked up the theme and tied it to college advising.

The argument in these essays is that work is, well, work, and that most of us have to do unpleasant work some or all of the time.  If you can indulge the desire to do what you love, you must be acting out of a sense of privilege and/or selfishness.

This critique is true, but it is also based in an unimaginative reading of the phrase.  Most often, when someone says "do what you love" they mean that you should "do what YOU like."  Put that way, with an emphasis on the self, and a definition of love as nothing more than pleasure, the advice to do what you love is, indeed, as bad as Tokumitsu argues. But to simply say that work is often crummy is no more satisfying, ultimately, that saying work ought to be pleasant.  Both views resign people to a work life that lacks meaning--if dedicated to self-indulgence, work reinforces the gap between rich and poor, if acknowledged as unpleasant, work reinforces the belief that life guarantees dissatisfaction.

Two weekends ago I attended the Council of Independent Colleges conference on chaplaincy. There, a couple of dozen colleges and universities tried to figure out how college chaplains could help higher education to become more reflective, more honest, and more committed to the use of love in pursuit of the Good.  Or put another way, rather than reading "do what you love" as guidance to self-interest and pleasure, the theme of this conference was to put the emphasis on love itself, or to say "do what you do for LOVE."

This approach--where love carries deep, other-regarding, meaning--is nothing new.  Most religious traditions have some statement like Paul's in 1 Corinthians 13, where he reminds us that

"If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Adopting Paul's injunction as career guidance would do two things: first, it would remind us that the measure of love is in its ability to narrow distinctions among people, and between people and God. Second it would recall that any work can be done for love--whether that work demands hard labor or endless hours at a computer, years of education or none at all.

What does this have to do with small schools?  Small schools are places where it is very difficult to "do what YOU like" since almost no one does one thing.  We teach courses we don't want to teach, we administer programs where we have no expertise, we attend events with little connection to our passions or expertise.  We even tout this experience as part of the attraction of a small school, for faculty and students alike.  we tell people that if you come here you will matter because you cannot be isolated, narrowed, or dedicated only to those things that you like the most.  Of course we fail to take the next step--to describe this way of working as an act of love, and thus as something that might be a pathway to meaning beyond the college campus.  That is our failure, but one that small schools ought to rectify.

If we do, then we can describe ourselves not just as small, or as places where students matter or where people build close relationships.  Instead we can say that ultimately we are about creating a community based on love--not the sort dedicated to self-satisfaction but the sort that acknowledges that humble connection with others is one of the best ways to live.