For Life

One of the most helpful bits of advice I received with regard to managing and motivating a workforce was how to form an appeal. The abridged version is this: people have different reasons for following a directive. Some will do it out of a sense of pride in the company or the team; some will comply because they respect you, the boss, and seek to please you; some will only follow if they perceive personal gain. If you, as a supervisor can take to time to find what motivates them, you can succeed in getting them to do as you ask. Pretty good advice if you think about it.

The other day, I came across a "souvenir" from my grandmother's grammar school. Just below the date it reads: Not for school but for life we learn. Motivation. In this case, it's not about simply getting passing grades or making it to the end of a semester or the next twelve years; it is for life --my life-- I choose to learn. I'll confess, that's not exactly how I viewed my tenure in elementary school or high school, for that matter. I lived from test to test or paper to paper; scholastically, what happened in between was of little consequence to me. I just wanted a passing grade; learning was not my motivation (I was a box-checker even then). 

But I have come to realize just how foolish an approach that was. So often I have rued the days I did not pay attention in Mr. Walton's Christian Perspectives class or Miss Williamson's World History class. Learning means something, and it means something to life --mine as well as the lives of those around me. Getting a grade, even holding a diploma in my hands is a hollow victory if I can't recite one useful piece of information or process and apply what I have learned.

Is learning something we should merely do for ourselves? Of course not, but in order to effectively convince anyone of anything, we have to first believe it, know it, and be committed to learning as much as we can about what it is and why we believe it. We need to learn in order to benefit others. In becoming who God has called us to be, in giving our best effort, in stretching and growing as human beings, we elevate the entire order. We inspire others to achieve, we lead others to know difficult things can be possible, we share our lessons with others in the hopes they will break our records and outdo our performance, and we construct a springboard with our lives from which others may launch to greater heights and far into the future.

And, with regard to souvenirs, most of us carry a camera with us wherever we go. We commemorate our lunches, for Pete's sake! Why? Hopefully, we do it to remind ourselves not that we ate, but what the journey to fullness looked like, tasted like. What good is knowing that we ate --our bellies should tell us as much; but it's the knowing what we ate and with whom that should be worth remembering. That's what makes life --the savoring, the experiencing, the odyssey.

We are individuals but we are not islands. Our actions matter. Our inaction matters. It is for life we learn --our life, the lives of those around us, and the perpetuity of humanity.