Quote of the Week: Work is the best therapy

We work to earn a living, it is true; but as we toil, let us also remember that we are building a life. Our work determines what that life will be. Work is honorable. It is good therapy for most problems. It is the antidote for worry. It is the equalizer for deficiency of native endowment. Work makes it possible for the average to approach genius. What we may lack in aptitude, we can make up for in performance. -J. Richard Clarke, 1982

If you are poor, work. If you are happy, work. Idleness gives room for doubts and fears. If disappointments come, keep right on working. If sorrow overwhelms you, work....When faith falters and reason fails, just work. When dreams are shattered and hope seems dead, work. Work as if your life were in peril. It really is. No matter what ails you, work. Work faithfully. ... Work is the greatest remedy available for both mental and physical afflictions. - The Forbes Scrapbook of Thoughts on the Business of Life, 1964

Last Sunday at church I attended a lesson about Work and Responsibility. It was actually one of the best Sunday School lessons I've been to in quite sometime and it really had an affect on me. I truly do believe that work is an incredible remedy for mental and physical afflictions. I tend to go along with much of my generation and daydream about never having to work and just playing all the time. I want to have endless amounts of money without having to work at it. I want to have fun, fun and more fun.

When these two quotes were read in class they really hit me. I thought about the times in my life when I have worked really hard at something (and I will admit I am a hard worker) and how good it felt. I thought about playing sports and how hard I worked at practice every day in high school and how much that hard work paid off. I thought about my survival trip in the wilderness of Alaska and how much work it took to survive and how incredibly happy I was out there because of all of the hard work.

I have decided that when I get lazy or when I start daydreaming about having an "easy" life, that is the time when I struggle the most. I lose focus and I lose faith and I begin to think that I deserve everything to come easy and I start to not enjoy anything. Work is great therapy. It is a great way to find out what you are really made of. You are the only one that can determine how hard you are willing to work in this life. No matter who you are or what sort of work you do, when you work your hardest you will find the greatest joy and satisfaction.

My new focus is working my hardest when it comes to work, play and everything else in between!