Barren Busyness

Greetings Dear Reader,

Some days at work begin in the parking lot.  A student or colleague will have a question that needs asking before I even get in the building.  I try to train my students that this is a poor practice.  I will politely ask the assailant to let me land and then we can talk.  Very seldom does the issue turn out to be as urgent as he or she thinks it is.

At times I arrive and begin to handle things one after another.  I then look up and lunch time is past or it may even be nearly time to leave for home.  When I leave for home the last thing I do is make a list of things to do tomorrow.  There are many days where that list laughs at me midway through the day.

Most of the time I get to see the rewards of my work.  I see men and women risking much to gain a career over a job.  I get to watch the metamorphic emergence into trained and capable professionals.  At times though I let the busy nature of what I do get in front of the reason I do it.  When scheduling, documenting, and logging become the focus instead a part of the process it is very frustrating.

The busyness of the process is very barren.  If I forget that the tedious bits of the job are part of the process of changing lives then the job is very unpleasant.  When I remember though that a father of four is in a good job helping others do their jobs instead of in prison the endless meetings and paper work are worth it. 

It seems that all of life can be this way.  If I forget the purpose behind what I do then the tedium of mundane tasks become a vast wasteland of a perfunctory nature.  If, however, I remember that one more meeting or another phone call will may be the one that gets a student a job or keep him in school then it is worth it.  If I remember that one more kindness might heal a spirit or another moment of patience may undo someone’s anger then that too is worth it.  This is the part of the journey that makes the busyness less barren.  As in so many cases it is the focus that builds purpose.

Wishing you joy in the journey,

Aramis Thorn

Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a home owner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure store."