Welcome to Career Advise, the newsletter providing career advice, how-tos, and life musings through an optimistic and intriguing lens.

Each week, you will receive two newsletters written by the Oppstartr Team. Mondays — Our career-focused newsletter. Fridays — Out of Office where we discuss life and other thought-provoking ideas.

Today’s Pillar: Temper the Mind

I once heard a version of the Three Bricklayers tale as told by Dr. Peter Kreeft, a professor of Philosophy at Boston College. It is paraphrased below:

A traveler was walking down a muddy road and saw a mason lugging a block of stone toward a work site. The traveler stopped and asked the man struggling with the stone what he was doing. The mason replied, “I am trying to get this damn stone through this damn mud.” Right behind the first mason, another mason was completing the same task with a smile on his face. The traveler then asked the second mason what he was doing. He replied, “I am helping to build a Cathedral.”

Work for the Greater Good and Find Joy.

In today’s age of the “self above all else” and the belief that difficulty should be avoided, oh how easy it is to be the first mason. The pain of our tasks can easily overshadow or completely mask the ultimate mission. Without a true mission or a clear picture of what we are working towards, we will default to focusing on the pains of our labor rather than the final fruits of our labor. When we only focus on the pain, negative emotions and sentiments arise. We may not be conscious that these negative emotions and sentiments are building up, and they tend to compound over time, leading to despair, cynicism, exhaustion, or a host of unwanted outcomes.

Remember: There is nothing of importance or worth that ever comes without struggle and strife. It’s the old adage, “If it were easy, everyone would do it.”

Joy

Contributing to something greater than yourself will bring self-actualization. Increasingly, as a society, we are longing for meaning in our careers. We need to feel and, better yet, know that our work is contributing to a greater good – a mission. Working toward a mission larger than us contributes to our joy.

In my opinion, joy is a longer-lasting feeling, and happiness is more in the moment. Since joy is longer-lasting, it can weather the moments of pain and hardship. For that reason, having a mission will contribute to joy since it transcends the fleeting moments of struggle.

Was the second mason happy in that moment? ... I am not sure. However, I'd bet he had joy, whereas the first mason possessed neither joy nor happiness.

Discussion & Thought

Are you the first mason, or are you the second mason? What is your mission, or are you still searching for it? Most jobs have some unpleasant work, but what is the mission of your work? It could be an overarching societal goal or goal of your employer.

Thank you for reading Career Advise. Be sure to read our upcoming Out of Office issue on Friday.

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