It is late afternoon at work; I usually take this time when I am tired to work on tasks that are less work than my main work. This time I am preparing a talk about engineering for non-engineers. I needed some inspiration, so I decided to go for a short walk. The streets of downtown Austin, TX around Silicon Labs office are the busiest now. Employees rushing home from every office. They all look like they hate work; I guess that’s the norm. And if you like work, you might be suffering from workaholism, right?

I tried to bring back my attention to the talk that I am preparing. I promised my coordinator to deliver a draft to her within a week or two. I remembered how I said it: “My to-do list is like this, work, work, work, work, and then prepare a draft and send it to Juliet.” I thought of how funny it was. I also thought of how queer it is to have a to-do list. It always gets refilled with more tasks. I never get to finish it. But it keeps me going. Like Sisyphus. Have you not heard of Sisyphus?

He is a greek mythology titan that gets punished by the gods to keep pushing a rock up a mountain on and on.

…seeking to raise a monstrous stone with his two hands. In fact, he would get a purchase with hands and feet and keep pushing the stone toward the crest of a hill, but as often as he was about to heave it over the top, the weight would turn it back, and then down again to the plain would come rolling the shameless stone. But he would strain again and thrust it back, and the sweat flowed down from his limbs…
—Homer, Odyssey 11, 593–600

Homerus lines make me feel that Homerus was cursed to be stuck in the modern world that we live. My job responsibilities are pretty much that rock. Every time I get to the hill crest, it all starts all over.

the whole effort of a body straining to raise the huge stone, to roll it and push it up a slope a hundred times over; one sees the face screwed up, the cheek tight against the stone, the shoulder bracing the clay covered mass, the foot wedging it…
—A. Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays

What Camus sees in Sisyphus is an unmatched struggle; Sisyphus is an endurance icon. Yet, when you think about it; How unfortunate Sisyphus would be if the stone was too easy to push? Or if the hill wasn’t so steep? or else, what a misery would it be if Sisyphus was unable to move the stone at all? Sisyphus is after all privileged with the strength he has. And also with the difficult-enough challenge he is facing.

The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
—A. Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays

Unlike Camus, we , modern-lifers, do not need to imagine how Sisyphus feels; We know how he feels. My Monday mornings are so happy and exciting. Going to work is so rewarding in itself that I need no supplementary meaning. Even though my to-do list is so full yet so empty of any greater meaning. Why why does that even matter?

The connection of happiness and meaning is such a religious/backwards belief. While meaning might provide for greater happiness, it is not necessary. One does not have to be saving the world everyday so to be happy. Besides, a world that everyone is always saving is pretty apocalyptic; I am not sure if I want my world to be that dangerous.

We eat the same food over and over. Our plates get refilled over and over. Yet the taste of a delicious bacon cheese burger never goes away. The meaning of eating a burger is actually pretty evil; Yet it tastes great. Similar to food, sex is pretty repetitive too. Penetration in itself is pretty repetitive, yet is very rewarding. And the meaning? sex for pleasure has no meaning. I hope you get my point by now. Life’s pointlessness does not change anything about how happy we are.

Do we not feel the breath of empty space?
—F. Nietzsche, “The Parable of the Madman”

Yes we do, and it is a sweet breath. I would rather live with emptiness than with an angry god or a repressive clergy.