no longer be able to dissociate yourself from what you’ve
created. And this is dangerous territory. The real job in the
work we do is to understand this temptation and use it to our
advantage. Every compulsion is not a calling, but your life’s
work may begin with a prompting so strong it borders on
obsession. What you must do is learn to temper it, to live in
the tension of being driven without driving yourself mad. To
master the craft so it doesn’t master you. This is the only
way to master the art of work, to recognize the inclinations
in us that, when left unchecked, would destroy us.
What good, then, is it to pursue a calling if the pursuit
may destroy you? How do we balance this tension between
the ceaseless call of work and life itself? We must recognize
what we don’t know. Many world-famous artists were
considered fools by their contemporaries. Fortunately, their
work endured, maybe sometimes in spite of themselves. But
their lives offer an important lesson: we don’t have to give
in to despair. We can trust that legacy follows faithfulness.
There is always a deeper story.
During the Second World War, British author J. R. R.
Tolkien, who would go on to write one of the greatest
fantasy novels of the twentieth century, was contemplating
death. Would he live through such turbulent times or die in
the middle of completing his life’s work? He didn’t know,
and the possibility of not completing such a task haunted
him. To process his fears, Tolkien wrote a short story about