Work: satisfaction and shock absorber – Sunday, September 11, 1960
In discussing the subject of living with ourselves, and of learning to live with life, some recent weeks ago, at this same hour, we made the remark that work itself is one of life’s surest satisfactions, and one of’ its surest shock absorbers.
Work is much less wearing, much less wearisome than worry, and often it isn’t so much the work men do that wears them away as the friction against which they do it—friction, and the frustration of not using life in a way that. gives an inner peace and a deep-seated satisfaction. Work is a basic law of life. The Lord God has so said. And the use of intelligence, and talents, and the creative and productive powers of mind and of muscle is expected of us. Without the dignity of work, without the sense of usefulness and accomplishment, men will surely deteriorate, will surely lose some self-respect, and the feeling of being a contributing part. After all we owe a kind of rent, if we may call it that or at least an obligation—for the space we occupy on earth, for the tenancy and tenure we have here, for the beauty and the sustenance, and the privilege of living life.
By reason of being alive we have a responsibility to study, to learn, to work, to develop, to contribute, to serve, to improve, to pay a debt to the past, to pay our way in the present, and to pass on something to the future. And there is waste—waste of time—waste of talent, waste of. energy and effort, waste of life, and a quality of discontent, without willing, useful work. The Lord God himself has set the example in his own creative activity, and there is every evidence in nature and the universe of an ever and on-going creative, productive process. There is a building, strengthening, healing power in useful, willing work—work that doesn’t unwillingly hold back—work that crowds out worry.
“Work,” said Thomas Carlyle, “is the grand cure for all the maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind—honest work, which you intend getting done.”1 “Blessed is he who has found his work;” for work itself is one of life’s surest satisfactions, and one of its surest shock absorbers.2
1Thomas Carlyle, Address in Edinburgh, April 2, 1866
2Ibid, Past and Present
“The Spoken Word,” heard over Radio Station KSL and the CBS Radio Network, from the Tabernacle, Temple Square, Salt Lake City, Sunday. September 11, 1960. 11:30 a.m. to 12:00 noon, Eastern Time. Copyright 1960
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September 11, 1960
Broadcast Number 1,621