—Geronta, many people return home from work stressed out.
—I suggest to men that if they can, they should find an open church after work, go in, light a candle and stay inside for ten to fifteen minutes. Or go sit in a park somewhere and read a small section of the Gospel, so as to quiet down a bit. Then they can go home in peace, smiling, instead of stressed out and ready to pick a fight. They shouldn’t bring work problems home with them—leave them at the door on the way out.
—But Geronta, some of them are justified, for their work responsibilities fill them with anxiety. Read more →
Love for Work
—Geronta, why do so many people feel bored at work?
—Maybe they don’t love their job? Or, maybe they work on the same thing continually? With some jobs—say at a factory where they make door and window frames—a laborer might do the same thing from morning till the time he leaves: glue, glue, glue. Another constantly handles windows; another, putty. They constantly do the same monotonous work; and their boss is always watching them—not for just one or two days, either. It is always the “same old, same old,” to the point of boredom. In the old days it wasn’t like that though. A contractor would be given four walls from the carpenters and was expected to present the owner with a finished house and the key. He would have built the floors, the door and window frames, and would even have set the windows with putty. Afterward he would have built spiral staircases, turned banisters; after that he would have painted, built the cupboards and the shelves—even the furniture! Even if he didn’t do all of it himself, he knew how to do it. In a pinch a contractor could even put the tiles on the roof. Read more →