Tag: work

The Industrial Age

Jennifred Jones

Sometimes the industrial age is put down or thought of as antiquated and binding.

I believe every age throughout history was needed and had its place – no sense despising it, thinking it worthless…we’re on to bigger and better now!

BUT! Without the industrial age there’d be many, many things (luxuries) (bad word nowadays) we’d be without…All these things we never really needed. We can all do without almost everything, so why waste time thinking up something new and helpful and convenient to make life easier? (haha)

Here are some examples of those worthless unneeded things that we like and love resulting from the hard, hard, hard work of many, many men and boys, with their women alongside them produced during the industrial revolution:

  • Mining – grueling work to bring up iron ore, and coal, and minerals and water and oil
  • Steel mills – to convert the iron ore into steel beams to build bridges and buildings
  • Construction machinery – to build whatever we wanted to build
  • Trains – to transport all these goods from one place to another
  • Bridges – to span creeks, streams, treacherous waters so we could get to the other side
  • Skyscrapers – beautiful city buildings for business and home
  • Cars – to drive to town or grandmas or see the USA
  • Airplanes – we can go anywhere!
  • Textile mills – we don’t have to use the spinning wheel anymore or fabric loom
  • Factories – many kinds to produce many things we take for granted
  • Refineries – to produce oil and wax etc….something we cannot do in our backyard
  • Sewing machines, dishwashers, refrigerators, freezers, garbage disposals, indoor plumbing, sinks, toilets, clawfoot tubs, lamps, fans, even the measly little light bulb!

Did we or did we not need the industrial revolution? Was it a good thing? Did it help us people nowadays?

All these things were thoughts and ideas of good men with the goal of making life less grueling so they could have more time with their families and rest and relax a bit…and many of us are resting and relaxing a bit – because of these men’s hard work.

I am thankful for the industrial revolution, the men who worked it and the results from their labors. My life is better because of it.

Try!

Jennifred Jones

Try, try again!

The best way to conquer fear of failure or failure itself is to try again. There’s nothing like a fresh start to get you moving again…to get your ideas flowing.

‘Yea, but I’ve tried and failed so many times, I feel shut down and tired of trying!’

I had an old car. It was a 1984 Audi 5000s… butter yellow. Loved it! But sometimes it took many times to get started. One sunny, bitter cold day in Chicago, I was leaving my son’s and sitting in the car working to get it started. It was a combination of pressing the gas pedal, while turning the engine and holding it just the right amount of time until the engine caught. I couldn’t try too many times in a row, or it’d flood the engine, but I did have to keep trying. After a number of times it finally started and kept running and I was able to drive home. I knew it would start eventually; I had been through this a number of times previously. But I had to try. It could have seemed easier to quit and say, ‘It’s not going to work’…and then I couldn’t go anywhere.

It’s the same way in life in so many other areas. We tend to give up too quickly. We need to develop our tenacity…we all have it, but it has to develop from its seed form.  Really, it’s part of growth. Try and grow a little bit. Try and fail and stop and think. Try again and move a step forward. Then again until it works, and you feel more confident.

Have you given up on something you need to try again?

Work Therapy

Jennifred Jones

The therapy of work. How does it work?

I don’t fully understand it. What I have experienced is when a problem gets me down – I am stumped – something is bothering me I cannot solve, if I get to work with some manual labor, it either eases the problem or solves it.

Back in the day the labor was done at the ironing board. Really cleaning of any sort will do the same thing. Then it became gardening, just digging my fingers in the dirt. Piano lessons were another. I could bang it out on the piano whatever was bothering me, and when the piece would get too hard, I would go out to the garden and start digging. When I came back in, my fingers were all limbered up and I could play through the piece too difficult before.

So I’ve come to the conclusion…rather than sit and stew, it’s better to get up and do!

Many hard projects have been accomplished this way. As the body works, the mind thinks.

Maybe that’s where the saying, “Work through your problems” comes from.