Tag: Work

How you made a difference today, and didn’t even realize it

Photo by Kampus Production on Pexels.com

Everyone knows how badly teenagers want to go to work, how they crave entry-level hourly jobs, and how they long to work in the food service industry. Yep, you’ve picked up on my sarcasm.

American teens are dreamers, and weren’t we all at that age? We wanted to create something, start a trend, build the next big thing, have friends and find adventure.

Depending on your generation, you either worked to build the fastest car, start the biggest rock band, conquer Super Mario Bros., or create the next internet sensation. Flipping burgers? You only did that because you had to.

So, when I dropped my teenage son off at his fast food job, I told him, “You are doing meaningful work today.”

He looked at me a little funny.

“Seriously, you are going to be the bright spot in someone’s day.”

His look became more inquisitive.

“Look, there are people that will soon begin their drive home after a long day. Others will be looking to spend time with family, and others will be eating to find comfort after hearing bad news,” I said. “And they will be coming into your restaurant to find what they are looking for. Feed them well, and be that bright spot.”

“Thank you, Dad,” he replied.

“It takes a special person to undertake the work of feeding people. I’m proud of you.”

He shut the door, entered the restaurant, and I drove off.

Okay, now that I read my own words, it looks a little sappy. Either that, or I just penned the latest “Family, isn’t it about Time” commercial. Nevertheless, I meant every word.

I have recently documented my recent health struggles, so I’m not endorsing emotional eating. However, I will tell you that on more than one occasion, the right fast food clerk, and the right kitchen crew have offered me relief on some dark days. Furthermore, they have fed me on a quick schedule when my time was short. And I appreciated their efforts every time.

Our kids are taught to aim for the stars, to seek careers where they can make a difference, to find meaning, purpose, and significance. They are taught not to settle for menial jobs, but to aim for greatness. Indeed, we want to encourage our kids to reach their full potential, and for most, that’s probably not in the kitchen of a fast food franchise.

But, if everyone is an astronaut, president, physicist, technology pioneer, and entrepreneur, then who will serve our food? If everyone is leading the next great social movement, who is caring for the patients in the nursing home? If everyone is discovering the cure for cancer, who is stocking the grocery stores?

If everyone is a teacher, who is cleaning the restrooms? If everyone’s a doctor, who’s filling the prescriptions?

You see, for our society to function, we need people in every role of our workforce, and our society will become great when every member of our workforce, from the service sector, to retail, to medical, to manufacturing, see their value and the importance of their work.

And the greatest companies in our society realize their role, and communicate their value to their workforce, who then reflect that conviction to their customers. That is why companies like ChickFilA and In-N-Out hold such high esteem in the fast food market, despite McDonalds having more locations. That’s why Whole Foods is such a revered brand, even though their prices are routinely higher than other grocery chains. That’s why Southwest Airlines is successful, despite having none of the frills of the other airlines.

These companies understand the role they play in our society, their inherent value, and they confer that value on their staff, who then internalizes it and represents it before the customers.

So, if you’re reading this, and you work in a fast food restaurant, you made a difference today, and you didn’t even realize it. You either did your job well, and were a bright spot in someone’s day (if so, congratulate yourself), or you did your job poorly and added to someone’s frustration. Either way, you made a difference.

If you’re reading this and you’re a CNA, then please know that you are probably the most important person in a patient’s care. Remember that, and bring them comfort.

If you work in a grocery store, you can greatly encourage someone who may be struggling emotionally, or may be feeling lonely.

If you are a doctor, you can save lives. If you are a lawyer, you can save freedoms. You get the point.

The point is, no matter what you do, you matter. And no matter what role you fill, you are needed, and you are valuable. And no matter what kind of day you’ve had, you’ve made a difference.

Therefore, as we perform our job duties today, let’s employ the words of the Apostle Paul in Colossians 3:23, “And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men.” Because when you work, you’re not working for your manager, the shareholders, or even the customers. You are working for God, and His will for you is to do good to others.

May God bless you and encourage you in your work today.

Live Fearlessly

Change is life.

For the past 20 years, the world has steadily been changing at a rapid pace, so much so that the younger generations have associated change with life. For a person younger than 40, the absence of change represents stagnation and death.

Today, students are either being trained for careers that won’t exist in 20 years, or they are being trained for careers that don’t exist yet. Their lives have so been defined by change that they aren’t even bothered by that fact.

For those of us north of 40, however, change brings uncertainty. It’s a new world, new parameters, and often, we struggle to understand the path forward. Therefore, we feel insecure, and we fear. Even the youth can experience massive personal changes that make them uncertain of their future.

Recently, I experienced a career change when I went from a stable position in a company where I had plateau’ed, to a performance-based position in an upstart. My new position involved selling a new product from a new company of which many of my clients would not be familiar. It was scary.

To find peace in my heart about the change, and the direction in which my life is moving, I returned to an old friend that has helped me through similar transitions in the past, the book of Psalms.

Each day, I pray that God will guide me, and that I will not only honor and glorify Him in my new position, but that I will also be a proper representative of Him. Furthermore, I pray that He protects my testimony, and that He steers me away from the pitfalls that could discredit my ministry.

Then, I read one of the psalms.

Today’s passage was Psalm 37, which includes the very famous verse 5, “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.”

All too often we misread this verse to say, “Decide what you want to do, then ask God to bless it, and He will.”

However, if we look to the preceding verses, we see that there is a far more blessed, and effective, approach to applying this verse to our lives.

Psalm 37:3 tells us to trust the Lord. Psalm 37:4 tells us to delight in the Lord. Psalm 37:4 tells us that if we delight in the Lord, He will give us the desires of our hearts.

Now, in reading and properly applying those two verses, we understand that our first priority is to seek the Lord, trust the Lord, and bring our values and desires in line with His. Once we do this, He gives us those desires.

Then, we commit our way to the Lord. In committing our way to the Lord, we are not simply naming a blessing we want and claiming it. Instead, we are committing to serve Him, honor Him and glorify Him through our “way.” We are committing our way unto Him by bringing our way into alignment with Him. Once we do that, He works His will in the situation, and we know that God works all things to our benefit.

There is no safer place to be than the will of God.

So today, if you live with anxiety, return to the scriptures. I recommend the Psalms in times like these. Read the scriptures. Trust the scriptures. Assess what God wants you to do, and what you can do to honor Him. Pray. Then, put your assessment into action, and trust that God holds you in the palm of His hand, that no weapon formed against you will prosper, and regardless of the outcome, you will win.

The Lost Art of Leisure

16708472_10211627013496723_1898660107827657514_n “The world went and got itself into a big ole hurry,” wrote Brooks Hatlin to his former cellmates at Shawshank prison in the movie, The Shawshank Redemption. Brooks had served a 50 year sentence in Shawshank before being paroled in 1954.

While the pace of life in 1954 seems like a leisurely dream today, it moved at a breakneck speed for those accustomed to the pace of life in 1904, like Brooks.

The more time passes, the faster the pace of life. It’s not your imagination, and it’s not the effect of age. Life is really more hectic today than it was in 1954, or 1984, heck, even 2004.

The fast pace of life today would surprise futurists of the 1960s, who predicted that computer technology and automation systems would reduce Americans’ workloads, resulting in more time for leisure. Instead, computer technology and automation systems led to large scale layoffs. While those laid-off workers ultimately found new work in a growing economy, the fact remains that automation didn’t cut down on workload, but rather increased the demands that employers placed on workers.

It’s a far-cry from the world envisioned by Walter Cronkite on his 1967 CBS News special which looked forward to life in 2001. Instead of a life of leisure, Americans are spending one of the most prosperous and technologically advanced periods in world history trying to keep up with rising demands.

Lost in all this is the art of leisure. In time past, workers had weekends off. Fathers took their kids fishing, or to their Little League baseball games. Extended families gathered for cookouts in the back yard, weekend trips were taken, and nobody batted an eye when you took your annual two-week road-trip vacation.

Offices observed all the national holidays, and life really slowed down around Christmas, with many companies offering paid time off between Christmas and New Year’s.

All of that has gone by the wayside. Vacations are now four-day adventures in resorts, hotels, cruises, or the ever-so-popular “stay-cation,” where you take time off, but never leave the house.

At one time stores were closed on Sundays. Today, they remain open. Retailers open on Thanksgiving to get an early start to the Christmas shopping season.

All of this has built into a perfect storm where Americans not only face ridiculous expectations at work, but also live their off-time in a frenzy, trying to accomplish as much as possible in as little time as possible, all while neglecting to rest.

During a recent interview with Michael P. Foley, author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Christianity, I asked what we could do as Americans to defend and preserve Christmas traditions. Foley said that we can preserve and defend Christmas simply by taking the time off and enjoying the holiday. He noted that we used to take Christmas off, as well as every Sunday, for leisure, adding that God gave us one day of rest per week.

He said if we truly want to preserve Christmas, we should observe it by taking the time off and enjoying that time with our families. Obviously, if you are in the military or are a first responder, this may not be an option. For those of us who have this option, however, we should take it.

It’s time that we all stop and take a look at what’s important in life. Look at your commitments, prioritize what’s most important to you, then budget your time and money accordingly. As you do this, set aside time for leisure. Take a day a week where you have no commitments, where you take a day to do nothing. Go fishing. Play a board game with the kids. Go to the local park. Take leisure.

Doing so doesn’t make you lazy. It brings you into harmony with God’s plan, which offers a day of rest every week, and periodic rest throughout the year. As Psalm 127:2 says, “He giveth his beloved sleep.”

Blood, Sweat and Tears: The forgotten formula for long-term peace and prosperity in America

17504623_1425582290846774_1723984855442417737_o During a segment on my morning drive talk show on News/Talk 102.3 KXYL, Woody Tasch of the Slow Money Institute and I discussed the perils of the modern American economy which emphasize short-term profit over a long-term vision of growth and development.

While I haven’t learned enough about the Slow Money Institute to offer any kind of endorsement, the premise of his organization falls right in line with a problem I have with the modern way of doing business in America.

Tasch’s organization raises money to offer no-interest loans to small family farms that serve local communities. His vision seeks to move America away from centrally planned agriculture to local farming by sparking a revival through financial aid.

The road will be long, and will require substantial investments of money, time and effort before any return is realized, let alone the realization of his dream. But Tasch realizes that, and forges ahead anyway.

And, without knowing his political or religious views, I wish him well, because I know that if America is truly to become great again, it will need a generation of Taschs to rise up and plant trees beneath whose shade they may never sit.

America overcame all odds to win World War II and become a world superpower. We enjoyed unprecedented prosperity in the 1950s, survived an economic recession in the 1970s, enjoyed more unparalleled prosperity in the 1980s and 1990s, and, thanks to technology, enjoy a convenient, peaceful and prosperous lifestyle never before experienced in the history of man.

This way of life was not won in a single stock market rally. It wasn’t won in a lottery, and while World War II propelled us to superpower status, our success in the 1950s had as much to do with the ground that had been tilled in the progressive era as it did with Eisenhower’s leadership in the war and as President.

The proverb, previously referenced, that a society becomes great when old men plant trees under whose shade they know they’ll never sit, was the basis for American culture for more than 300 years. The colonists knew they would never enjoy the blessings of the nation they worked to build, yet they worked to build it anyway.

The revolutionary war soldiers knew that the nation of which they dreamed, where all men are regarded as equal in the sight of God and the law, would never mature in their lifetime, yet they took to the battlefields anyway, losing life and limb at the hands of the British army.

The founding fathers knew that their effort to shape a free and prosperous nation wouldn’t be completed in their lifetimes, yet they worked to create that nation anyway.

Men built farms, businesses, communities, towns and cities, dreaming of the greatness those things would become long after they passed. Fathers left legacies and inheritances to their children. Factories were built. Companies started. New inventions sent to market. Through this great society that arose on the premise of planting trees for the next generation, we saw the industrial and technology revolutions arise, which not only lifted America out of poverty, but much of the world as well.

Today, we enjoy the shade of those trees planted by our forefathers. We stand on the shoulders of giants. However, we have become so accustomed to enjoying prosperity, we’ve forgotten how to build it for the future.

You will rarely find a CEO of a publicly traded company that looks beyond the next quarter’s earnings report. After all, that’s the benchmark by which his performance is measured. The board of directors want to see an increasing stock price, strong earnings reports, and good coverage in the media.

A temporary drop in stock price, earnings, or public perception can be the end of a CEO’s career, even if that temporary downturn could lead to a brighter long-term future for the company. Therefore, few look farther than 3-6 months out. There’s no reward for planting trees for the next generation. In fact, it can be penalized.

It’s not just Wall Street CEO’s. Politicians rarely look past the next election, therefore long-term solutions are never offered. The Interstate Highway system, Civil Rights legislation, Social Security, and Women’s Suffrage would never pass in today’s political climate. In times past, politicians would risk their political careers if they thought it would better the country long-term.

Consumers rarely look beyond the next iPhone, smart screen or automobile. What legacy are we building and leaving for the next generation? Where are the trees we are planting?

We need a new generation to rise up, and we don’t necessarily have to wait for that generation to be born or come of age. The Baby Boomers, Gen-X, Y, or the Millennials can do this. We need a generation to rise up and plant trees for tomorrow, trees under whose shade they may never sit.

The opportunities are there. Wall Street has sucked up the big money in most industries, leaving a vacuum on Main Street that can be filled by the right breed of entrepreneurs. We can build America into a great country. We can do what generations of great Americans did before us.

The question is, are we willing? Are we willing to begin a project that will not be completed in our lifetime? Are we willing to make the sacrifices to benefit the generations to come?

I hope I am.