In Arthur Miller’s brilliant 1949 tragedy the traveling salesman Willy Loman works his heart out, stresses himself to the max, and becomes not just bone weary but disillusioned, hopeless, and suicidal. From my clinical experience I know that when you have a Willy Loman for a father it makes a huge impact to watch him work as hard as humanly possible, keep failing, and drink himself into a stupor when he comes home, only to launch himself into trying even harder the next day with the same bad results. My clients with fathers who live Willie Loman’s life cannot find the motivation to try at work and don’t know why. Having worked with such clients the pivot point for them to shake off their father’s influence and find inner motivation is the moment they realize the lesson their father taught them. That lesson is don’t bother trying because you’re going to fail no matter how many hours you work and how much effort you invest. There is another way sketched out in a fascinating book by Mason Currey called Daily Rituals: Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work. Currey studied the lives of highly successful people revered for their brilliance, creativity, and impact on science, society, and culture. He was looking for one thing they all shared in common and he found it among such notables as Beethoven, Ben Franklin, Darwin, Freud, Franz Kafka, Ernest Hemingway, Georgia O’Keefe, and Frank Llyod Wright. What he found was life balance. These individuals did not work 24/7. They parceled out their day for work, conversing with friends, reading, enjoying culture, resting, and having a good night of restorative sleep. If poor Willy Loman had led a more balanced existence he very likely would not have crashed his car into a tree to redeem his failed life in the hopes of getting life insurance for his son Bif. I notice with some clients that, like Willy, financial anxiety drives them to lead a highly unbalanced life filled with stress. I think it’s very important to grasp the point that balance increases physical, mental, and emotional health and increases the odds of success in whatever field the person is in.
