Hard Work
“a great deal of effort or endurance”
I grew up in an environment (in an era) where we were expected to work hard: with our schooling and with our chores. If any of us kids were found around the house “doin’ nothin’”, one or the other parent would say “you’ve got nothing to do??? I’ll give you something to do”. In our household, working hard was worshipped. We were only considered of value or worthy if we were busy working on something.
My dad tells this story of when he was in the army. He mostly did carpentry and construction work. If there wasn’t enough to do then he would be put on KP duty, which he hated. So in order to avoid KP duty he would take a plank of wood, hammer nails down along the sides of it, and then when he filled it up with nails, he would proceed to take out all the nails…one by one. This way he always “looked” like he was hard at work.
One day the colonel came by and saw that my dad was “working” hard and said to him “Bob, you’re always working” and proceeded to reward him with a three-day furlough. What did I learn from this story? You don’t have to be doing anything of value, you just have to look like you’re doing something of value… and people will think you’re a hard worker.
Cut to when I was working as an executive assistant decades ago. There would often be days where I was all caught with my tasks. If my boss had nothing else for me to do, he would have me go to the head boss’s assistant and ask her if she had anything I could do. For me this was equivalent to my dad’s KP duty. So whenever I had nothing to do, I would completely re-do all the file folders and labels in my four-drawer filing cabinet. I would take my time, carefully and meticulously, typing up all new labels (on a typewriter…this was before computers). Then I would carefully and meticulously put the labels on all the new file folders. If I still had nothing to do I would completely re-organize my filing system. Like my dad, I could always come up with something to do to look like I was hard at work.
How on earth is all of this related to what we consider “hard work”? Well I’ll tell you. We don’t have to work hard in order to do anything of value. That being said, when we’re going after something that we truly desire, we must be willing to put in the time and effort to make it happen. Does it necessarily have to be “hard” in order to be of value? No. But there’s something in our psyche that translates “hard work” into it being more valued.
For instance running the L.A. Marathon was hard, there’s no way to make that easy…except, because I put in all the time and effort with nine months of training, it made it so I was ABLE to do it without passing out after the first mile.
Essentially, it comes down to this: if it’s worth going after, then it’s worth putting in the necessary time and effort in doing it well.
How about you? Is hard work a core value for you?
BTW…here’s what it looked like to begin with …
joyfully,
Maureen
The Mandala Lady
🌟 bringing sanity to an insane world through the art of mandalas
About the 2024 Mandalas of the Day
Each day I will create and post a mandala inspired by one of 366 “value” words chosen randomly. The objective being to discover for myself which ones would best represent my core values…and by doing so, I hope it inspires you to determine your own.
Mandala of the Day 