The Job You Didn't Want

My boys,

There was a time when I took a job I did not want anyone to know I had.

I was cleaning.

Nothing complicated. Nothing impressive. The kind of work people notice only when you don't do it well.

Trash cans. Floors. Bathrooms. Things left behind by other people.

I remember the first time I really looked at myself doing it.

Gloves on.

Trash bag in my hand.

Standing in a bathroom cleaning someone else's mess.

And I was ashamed.

Not because there is anything shameful about cleaning.

I know that now.

I was ashamed because I had already built a different picture of myself in my head.

I thought I was supposed to be doing something bigger.

I had ideas.

Ambition.

Plans.

I believed I was capable of more, and instead I was standing there with a mop.

That bothered my pride more than the work ever did.

I worried about someone I knew seeing me.

I worried they would think I had failed.

So I did something foolish that people often do when their ego gets wounded.

I treated the job as if it were beneath me while depending on the money it paid me.

Eventually I had to confront that.

Either the work was honest or it wasn't.

If it was honest, then the shame belonged to me, not the job.

So I started doing it differently.

I cleaned the corners people skipped.

I wiped underneath things.

I learned which products actually worked instead of simply using more of them.

I started noticing the difference between something looking clean and actually being clean.

Most importantly, I learned what happens when you do necessary work that nobody intends to praise you for.

You either develop standards or you don't.

Years later, I would own a coffee company.

And suddenly bathrooms mattered again.

Floors mattered.

Trash cans mattered.

The underside of a counter mattered.

I could walk into a shop and notice things other people walked past because once upon a time I had been the person responsible for them.

I learned that a dirty bathroom can undo a beautiful cup of coffee.

I learned that hospitality is not what happens only at the counter.

It is whether the door handle is clean.

Whether the trash is overflowing.

Whether someone cared enough to notice what the guest should never have to notice.

That job I was embarrassed to have was teaching me how to operate a business before I had one.

More than that, it was teaching me something about dignity.

There is no shame in honest work.

There is shame in believing another person's honest work makes them smaller than you.

That lesson changed the way I see people.

The person sweeping the floor.

The dishwasher.

The person hauling boxes through the back door.

The person cleaning the bathroom after everyone else has gone home.

I know something about that work.

I know how invisible it can feel.

And I know how necessary it is.

God has a strange way of preparing us.

Sometimes He gives you the classroom you wanted.

Sometimes He gives you a mop.

You usually understand the lesson much later.

So if you ever find yourselves doing work you believe is beneath you, be careful.

Your pride may be lying about the assignment.

Do the job well.

Learn everything it has to teach you.

Pay attention to the people who have been doing it longer than you.

And never become so successful that you lose the willingness to pick up the broom yourself.

Because if the floor needs sweeping and you are standing closest to the broom, boys...

That is your job.

I love you.

— Baba

Question:

What work have you called beneath you simply because it did not match the person you imagined yourself becoming?

Moral:

Honest work does not diminish a man. Pride does. Sometimes the job you never wanted becomes the classroom God uses to prepare you for the work you were asking Him to give you.

This story reflects real experiences and philosophies behind Backyard Brew. It is shared to inspire perspective and intention.

Author: R. Solace