I don’t want to write today. I don’t feel particularly inspired. I would rather skip today’s work & look to tomorrow. But, that’s the easy stuff. That’s what we do when we give up. I remember Steve Earle saying that writing a song is the perspiration which comes after the inspiration. The first idea or concept is always easy. The devil, though, is in the details. It’s in the hard work.
Nobody likes doing it. Athletes don’t. Swimmers would prefer to sleep in instead of going to the pool to do laps at 5 am. I’ve never met a football player who enjoys two-a-days. Choose any athlete who has attained any level of success in their sport and they will tell you the hard work sucks. Professionals don’t like it. Everyone always wants to get home to be with their family, or work on a project at home, or just catch up on their sleep instead of being in meetings or working activities for long & sometimes insane hours. We all dislike it.
However, there is a silver lining. It is the hard work which makes us better. It is the refining fire purifying the precious metal. It is in the relentless pursuit of perfection where we catch excellence, as Vince Lombardi might say. The wood carver becomes more skilled the more wood he carves. The luthier can only become the master guitar maker by putting in the hard work. It’s true for every profession, project, and job ever held.
The hard work should excite us, dragons! The grind it out, bring it on, I got this challenge where we can thrive. Where we repeatedly prove ourselves to ourselves. We wear the hard work as a badge of honor. Because, after all, it IS an honor to serve one another, even if sometimes, it is the hard work.