I mean really…you gotta love Labor Day – it’s the day we celebrate work by doing absolutely no work at all!!! YAY for Labor Day!

I love holiday weekends. I love holidays period. I love that everyone else is willing to stop working at the same time so you don’t have to have guilt that you aren’t working yourself. It seriously makes the day so much more enjoyable when you no no one else is working either 🙂

Don’t get me wrong – I actually appreciate working. In fact did you know that people who don’t work have a shorter life expectancy?  So working makes you actually live longer!

Work is one of the best ways to help you feel better about yourself and about life. Work gives us a sense of pride for accomplishment. Work provides us the financial means to do fun things. Work gives us something to focus our attention on which keeps us from feeling down or depressed as much. Work allows us to interact with others and build relationships. Work helps build our self-esteem. And work improves the overall quality of our lives.

Work is important because it keeps us engaged in doing something useful. Just today my husband was telling me how he had gone to the grocery store and the lady bagging his groceries had to be 80 years old and he was feeling guilty that she was struggling and thought he should jump in and help her, but then he saw that she was smiling and suddenly he realized that this woman was working because it made her feel good…it gave her a sense of purpose. So instead of jumping in he went out of his way to make sure she knew he really appreciated her efforts.

All that being said, let’s be honest, it is pretty dang awesome that this weekend we get an entire day to celebrate working by doing no work at all!  As good as work is it is sure fun to have an extra day to have fun with our friends and family and enjoy the end of summer. Have a great holiday weekend everyone! Talk with you all next Tuesday!

~Amy Rees Anderson