The Same Tasks
“The workman of today works every day in his life at the same tasks, and this fate is no less absurd. But it is tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious.” ALBERT CAMUS · THE MYTH OF SISYPHUS
September opens where August left off. The question was how you keep going when the work never ends. Camus answers it by looking at someone who already is.
The workman. Not a philosopher, not a rebel. Somebody doing the same thing they did yesterday, and the day before, and every day this week. Camus says this is absurd, then narrows the claim. It becomes tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious.
That word, rare, does a lot of work. Most days you move through the routine without noticing the routine. Then something cracks it open. A birthday, a funeral, an idle Tuesday afternoon where you suddenly see the full arc of what you have been doing with your time.
Camus does not pity this person. He thinks the unconscious worker is the one to worry about. A life unexamined is comfortable, but it is also unlived. The moment of seeing is painful because it brings news, and the news is that you are spending yourself on this, and there is no one keeping score.
The month ahead is about what happens after you receive that news and decide to keep going anyway.
Pick one task you do automatically. Do it today as though you chose it, because you did.
