Go Do Something Productive
Today's Guest bog is from Krista Graham of New Hampshire and from the Lessons From My Parents crowdsourced book project. We invite you to share this project with your family and friends as we collect the meaningful life lessons that we all experience.
Parents often say to their bored children, “Go find something to do.” The children, obediently, do just that – usually by turning on a television, computer, or video game. As this scenario played out in my own home recently, it dawned on me that my mother never told us kids to “go find something to do.” Instead, she would say, “Go do something productive.” I suddenly realized that the subtle difference between those two commands accounts for the kind of person that I am today.
When I was a child, we had a massive, six-volume set of children's fairy tales and folklore. Almost daily, my mother would read to us from this collection. If she allowed me to choose the story, I would always ask for “The Little Man as Big as Your Thumb with Moustaches Seven Miles Long.” It was a gruesome story about an angry little elf that gets what is coming to him in the end. My sister's favorite story was “Snow White and Rose Red”—a romantic story about two kind sisters, their good-hearted mother, and an enchanted prince. Once in a while, we girls would agree to let my mother choose the story. Given the chance, she invariably chose, “Elsa and the Ten Little Elves.”
In a gorgeous blend of moralizing and magic, "Elsa and the Ten Little Elves" told of an idle, useless little girl who learned from ten little elves the value and delight of hard work. In the end, the ten little elves jumped into Elsa's hands and she discovered that the elves were indeed her own fingers, capable of doing far more than she had imagined. My mother delighted in this simple story because it extolled the very thing she loved most: the work of her hands.
My mother's hands were never idle, but they were also not simple busy. They were productive. Whenever her hands moved, they accomplished or created something. When I was very young, my mother's hands kept our house clean and organized and put healthy, home-made meals on our table. They gardened and canned. They also made everything from lampshades to candles, macramé to soaps. There was no limit to what my mother's hands could produce.
As I got older, I saw my mother's hands create and develop a thriving home business which earned enough income to put several of us kids through a decade of private schooling. When my mother's five children were grown, she went back to college and finished her degree. Throughout her fifties and into her sixties, she taught high school maths and sciences and made an impact on the lives of dozens of teens.
From observing my mother's life, I've learned something that has shaped my own perspective and choices. I've learned there is a big difference between being busy and being productive. I've learned that busy people are frazzled, stressed out, and unfulfilled – whereas productive people are focused, directed, and satisfied with the work of their hands. I've learned that busy people may kill time, but productive people redeem it.
As I write this, at the age of forty one, I have five children between the ages of eleven and twenty. Last year I finished my B. S. in Education, and now I am enrolled in graduate school. I am hoping to start a career teaching English in a community college right around the time my youngest enters high school. My friends' lives are slowing down and simplifying. They are mystified as to why I would start so many new things now, at the mid-point of my life, when I could be settling back to relax and enjoy the fruits of my first four decades of labor. To explain, I can only point to Elsa. The ten little elves are clamoring – not out of compulsion but out of delight—eager to see what they can accomplish with each new day. When I awake in the morning, thanks to my mother, I greet them:
“Let's go do something productive,” I say.