The Happiness of Industriousness
“Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end,” said former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. “It’s not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it’s when you’ve had everything to do, and you’ve done it.”
I had one of those days today, and the satisfaction I feel is indeed supreme. But the key to the satisfaction doesn’t lie in simply being busy. It lies in being busy with purpose, in knowing ahead of time what you’re aiming to accomplish. Then you find yourself genuinely engaged in your work; you slip into the flow of it—and that is a glorious thing.
You aren’t thinking about your goal while you’re doing the things that will make it happen; you’re just focused on the task at hand, giving yourself wholly to it, letting it absorb you. The satisfaction and the realization of progress come at the end, when you look back and see all that you have produced.
Of course one of my goals for the day was to snag some nature photos. My office was closed for the holiday weekend so I had the luxury of time on my side and decided to drive out to the local wetlands to see how they looked in early spring. The brush around the marsh was still bleached from winter, and most of the trees surrounding it were still bare. But the air was filled with the deep twang of the bullfrogs’ croaking and the trill of dozens of varieties of birds.
Although I wasn’t seeking them, I found four birds’ nests altogether. Now there is product of high industry! All those leaves and twigs and bits of mud and pieces of straw take countless trips to gather, and focused attention to detail to shape. But in the end, a home emerges, fine enough to raise young in, strong enough to weather thunderstorms and big winds and pelting rain. No wonder the birds were singing. Their goal was clear, their work fully engaging, their final product a work of art.
Their nests weren’t built in a single day. And the goals I’m working on are long-term, too. But moving effectively in their direction is delicious work. And the satisfaction that comes from seeing how much of the road I traveled has me high with happiness.
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