Preparation – Page 3 – : Tests Of A Man :

“Work is love made visible. And if you can’t work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of the people who work with joy.” ~Khalil Gibran, The Prophet

My initial response to this quote was to be appreciative of the employment that you currently have, and even if you don’t love what you do, do it with love. Realize the importance of what you do. Your job is not just about you, it’s about the people you provide that good/service for and more important your family. You provide the support to feed, clothe and even nurture.

But I’d like to go a little deeper than that. “Work is love made visible”. I have been coming across relationship issues but it seems that what is missing is that work that it takes to show the love. When we love someone, you work like hell to make sure that you succeed in showing that love. Then after a while, we get lazy and “fall back”. When I say work, I’m talking about the little things that say you care. Giving a hug, peck on the cheek, providing a meal, can be really simple actions but the most important aspect of this is where these actions come from. There is a difference in doing something out of duty, and doing something out of love. The sincerity is not displayed in the action itself but in the way it is presented.

Most people don’t equate the words work and love but they are a direct result of each other. When you love something/someone you show it through the work you put in to maintain that relationship to get better and more successful. But on the flip side of that is you’ll know whether someone loves you by the work that they put in. So the next time you say or think you love someone, think about the work that you have put in to display that love…now what do you think? Be blessed, #bedyanmic

Once in a while, I tend to whisper some of the words to this poem in my sons’ ears…exposing them to the difficult balance of being a man.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings – nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run –
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man my son!

#bedynamic

Category: Preparation

“Work Is Love Made Visible”

If by Rudyard Kipling