Working Hard?

Working late into the evening was often seen as real commitment to a job and understood as working hard. In fact if someone went home on time that person was often thought to be lazy or uncommitted and certainly wasn’t working as hard as the others who stayed on at their desks late into the evening. Why is working hard put on such a pedestal? It has sometimes been called the Protestant Work Ethic and people have said that this attitude can be seen in the Northern and Southern European attitudes to work.

From school we have been praised for working hard and told off for day dreaming if we sat looking at the book not moving our pen or perhaps staring out of the window.

Whilst we are working from home there is an opportunity to reappraise our work life balance and consider how we can really flourish and achieve all that we need to and perhaps more.

It doesn’t really need an experiment to show us what we experience, that the longer we spend working the less effective that work is, but in an article ‘Rest is not idleness’, developmental and educational psychologists show that cognitive ability and mental health are enhanced by times of reflection (or ‘day dreaming’) enabling clarity of thinking, effective working and emotional well being.

Mark Rodel in a recent article even suggests that the concept of working hard might actually be ‘perniciously dehumanising as it treats us all as units of production’ whether we are in education, the workplace and at home!

Rather than over-working to prove our value, we can use this as a time for reflective conversations  and take this time of pause as an opportunity to engage afresh with our true inner selves and to reconnect with God in stillness and reflection, setting aside the risks of our frenetic activity to the environment, our community and to ourselves by relentless ‘hard work’.

Yes, there will be times to concentrate and be active but by giving ourselves time to day dream, reflect and be still we can live life more fully.   

 

Jesus said: Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.

 

Heavenly Father, soothe my restless spirit with your inner calm, and help me, like Mary, to sit at your feet in quiet thought.

 

May the Peace of God, which (sur)passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God and of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.