The Corporate Icarus

Icarus (from the Greek myth) was warned not to fly too high or too low. He ignored the warning, and after the wax on his wings melted from flying too high, he plunged into the sea to drown.

A good friend comes to mind when I think of the Icarus legend. His pattern has always been to climb, climb, and climb the corporate ladder, so he can earn more, more, and more money as he does so. The trouble is that, three times now, he has climbed too high, and burnt out from stress. After a burn out, he takes a few months off work to recover. Then he starts fresh at a new company, only to plough headlong into the same mistake again. He’s now at the start of his fourth iteration of this pattern, though he assures me that he has it all under control this time.

What drives some of us to get obsessed with the corporate ladder? It’s unhealthy, unnecessary, and probably a load of other “un-” words. The money we lose from needing time to recuperate and heal, likely eats up all the extra money (and more) earned from working too much, not to mention the wasteful spending as a result of stress. It’s clearly self-defeating and unsustainable.