Energy and Effort Win

Hello and good day!

I had the opportunity to observe a very interesting person today.

I'll call him Mr. Energy.

Mr. Energy isn't a rah rah, in your face, blast you with energy kind of person. Mr. Energy is a person who people gravitate to because he is always doing something to serve. And by serving people, he becomes liked by most everybody who knows him.

To wit.

I am going to a wedding tomorrow. The wedding is being held in a rustic house out in the country. Neighbors around there have sheep, turkeys, ducks, cows, and dogs who wander around the neighborhood freely. The owner of the house where the wedding will be held has geese and dogs and chickens.

There are huge mountains in every direction, and you have to hike a mile down from the main road to get the house. The hike is on a choppy dirt road that floods and gets muddy when it rains. It should be quite a spectacle seeing attendees hike down the dirt hill.

There is a lot of work to be done getting the house ready. I volunteered to show up early and help out with getting everything set up. When I first showed up, I saw him.

A handful of us were there bright and early. Most of the men were slouched on a wooden bench looking at their cell phones, waiting for somebody to give directions.

Mr. Energy was following the owner of the house around asking what he could do to help. Before anybody else even bothered to get up from the bench, Mr. Energy was off and running.

He was hauling logs that the owner was using to hand carve an altar. He was picking up trash. Then he got assigned to cutting the grass.

Poor fellow. There was no push mower. All the owner had was a weed whacker. But there was no escaping it, the lawn needed to be cut. For the next 5 hours this strong, hardworking man, cut every inch of a half-acre plot with a weed whacker and did a great job.

After lunch, most of the rest of the gang kind of fizzled out, but he put in another solid hour and a half. Now here is the part where he really won everybody over.

He was burnt red from working under a hot mountain sun. He was covered head to toe in lawn shavings. There was a thick, dark, circle of sweat stained beneath his neckline. And his eyes were bloodshot red from having torrents of sweat pour into them.

After he finished all the work there was to do, he sat down on a bench pooped. But he has a reputation among the kids who know him as being somebody playful. He is good at organizing games.

While he was out there sweating and burning, a bunch more people came over to decorate the house and get things ready for the wedding. These people brought their kids and the kids immediately circled around him. They wanted a game.

I couldn't imagine that this fellow had the juice to go outside and run around with a bunch of kids. But that is what he did. He set aside his fatigue and went outside to run around with kids for a couple of hours.

Folks love this guy, and you can see why. He volunteered his entire day for the good of others. His work ethic is second to none and he worked without complaining or pausing every ten seconds to look at his phone.

\Men and woman alike respect him. Moms were thrilled to see their kids running around screaming, laughing, having good clean fun that didn't require electronics. And when it was all done, he simply said goodbye to everybody, and walked off into the horizon back to his house.\Just as quietly as he came, he left.

I love people like this.

I can tell you from personal experience watching my brother live and work with cacao farmers in Peru, and from my time working in Peru, and from a ton of other experiences, that hard work, energy, and effort are the surest way to win friends and influence people.

It cuts across cultures. It cuts across ages. It cuts across gender.

If you work hard in the service of others, and you do it with a good attitude, people will want to be your friend.

And since having good relationships is the key to a long and healthy life, it sure seems to me that hard work and effort and a good attitude are cornerstones of a life well lived.

I'm pretty sure that Mr. Energy gets a lot of party invites. Who wouldn't want that guy at their party?

Thank you so much for your time today.

I will send the final installment of Columbus to Fortunato tomorrow.

 I hope that you have a truly blessed day!

Adam

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