The Seeds that You Plant

 

We live in a world of instant gratification.

We post a photo on Facebook and seconds later people are “liking it.” If we’re hungry or thirsty, we go to a drive-through and minutes later are enjoying a hot meal or a cold drink.

There isn’t much in our world that makes us wait. We tend to gravitate towards activities that will give us immediate rewards.

The problem here is that almost everything worthwhile in life requires planning, discipline, hard work and long-term execution. This type of quality endeavor requires us to put off our immediate emotional reward for long term results. This is not always easy for our brains and the instant feedback this world teaches us to crave.
Real work requires hard days with no “likes.” It requires lots of activity with little immediate reward.

On the days when we seek quick satisfaction it’s good to remember this quote by Robert Louis Stevenson. Our prize is not emotional satisfaction, it’s much larger and doesn’t come easy.
The gardening metaphor in Stevenson’s quote is a good mindset for us to use as we go about our daily tasks.
What gardener expects plants to grow and produce fruit immediately? And isn’t the fruit much sweeter after we have watched it slowly mature and carefully tended to it day-after-day?

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.”  – Robert Louis Stevenson