Work

It's one of those long weekends that we look forward to. Well, it's one of those long weekends that we look forward to if we are not retired.

I feel blessed that if I pay attention, I can learn from smarter people than me. In that light, I found an article by Kevin Kelly.  He called it 103 Bits of Advice I Wish I Had Known. He began with these words.

Today is my birthday. I turn 70. I’ve learned a few things so far that might be helpful to others. For the past few years, I’ve jotted down bits of unsolicited advice each year and much to my surprise I have more to add this year. So here is my birthday gift to you all: 103 bits of wisdom I wish I had known when I was young.

Mr. Kelly also supplied links to a few earlier articles of the same nature, so I combined them for future research.

I brushed off the dust and started reading these bits of advice and found that several are related to work. In no particular order, these are shared below.

• If you stop to listen to a musician or street performer for more than a minute, you owe them a dollar.
• The best work ethic requires a good rest ethic.
• Don’t ever work for someone you don’t want to become.
• Your work will be endless, but your time is finite. You cannot limit the work so you must limit your time. Hours are the only thing you can manage.
• You cannot get smart people to work extremely hard just for money.
• The greatest rewards come from working on something that nobody has a name for. If you possibly can, work where there are no words for what you do.
• Don’t create things to make money; make money so you can create things. The reward for good work is more work.
• Work to become, not to acquire.
• Your passion in life should fit you exactly, but your purpose in life should exceed you. Work for something much larger than yourself.
• The greatest breakthroughs are missed because they look like hard work.
• When you have some success, the feeling of being an imposter can be real. Who am I fooling? But when you create things that only you — with your unique talents and experience — can do, then you are absolutely not an imposter. You are the ordained. It is your duty to work on things that only you can do.
• You can obsess about serving your customers/audience/clients, or you can obsess about beating the competition. Both work, but of the two, obsessing about your customers will take you further.

Some of these tidbits can apply directly to what we consider our work lives. Some (all?) apply to our everyday lives. The distinction probably won't be the same for all of us, but all of us can take something away from these gems.

If you'd like to watch Mr. Kelly present his 68th birthday list, you can find the video here.

And before I go, I'll mention one more quote.  I keep this one as an icon on my desktop as a frequent reminder. I do mean, frequent.

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Colossians 3:23-24