What?! Hard Work is FUN?!?!

What is the first thing that you think of when you hear the word, “work?” Fun? Backbreaking? Easy? Boring? Do you have any memories of working with your family? I want you to think about that for a minute… What did y’all do? Did you talk, laugh, create memories while you worked? I have a question for you: why are you smiling as you remember the tedious work that you had to do? Was it not hard work? Did you not complain and say something like, “Mom (or Dad), I do NOT want to (insert undesirable chore)!” Today, we will explore why you have positive memories of work when at the time, you may not have wanted to do the work.

Let us first travel back in time. Long before any of us were born. Let us look at what would work look like. If you lived in the 1800s what would you do for work? Well, back then, they did not have light bulbs, or dishwashers, or vacuums, or fancy machine plows. Let’s pretend that your dad was a farmer. Everyone would help out with the chores. The whole family would help plant, water and weed the garden. Everyone would have something that they were responsible for. They would often work together. Fathers, mothers and children would work side by side. Everyone would help the house chores or any other projects that were needed to help take care of the family.

I want you to think of a normal 3-legged stool. It is stable. It is going to be hard to knock it over; it is balanced. That is kind of like how the family worked together before the industrial revolution. When the dad had to go to work, it was like one of the legs of the stool was removed. More of the weight and responsibility to do the housework and tend the garden fell on the mothers and children. It’s a lot harder to balance the family life now.

Now fast forward to modern days. Now in the modern era of 2020, we have many labor-saving inventions. What does our work look like then? Well, it depends on what kind of family that you grew up in and the one that you raise your children in. Some families have chores while others do not. Some parents do all of the house keeping while children are playing on technology or with friends. Is playing with friends or on technology inherently bad? Of course not! Some screen time is okay! It is wonderful for children to create and sustain friendships with other children! We just want to make sure that those are not blown out of proportion. (If you want to learn more about how much screen time is appropriate for different age ranges, you can go to Google Scholar and search “screen time recommendations”. You can also play around with your search and explore. If I remember correctly, it is recommended that teens get less than 2 hours of screen time per day. And I think for toddlers it is around 30 minutes/ day* And each family will be different. There is not a specific plan that will work for every family in every circumstance.

Are there benefits to working as a family? I am so glad that you asked! Yes, there are!!! What happens when you do a mundane task (like cleaning a room, washing the dishes, cleaning the bathroom) together? The task is easy enough, so you do not have to put all of your focus on getting the task done. So, your brain is free to think. This is a marvelous opportunity to talk with each other! What happens when you talk? You CONNECT with each other! You build stronger relationships! Now will there be some griping or complaining when you ask your children to help you or each other with a chore, probably. But, in my opinion the benefits of working together as a family outweigh the cons. (You can go to Google Scholar and look up “benefits of family work” or something like that. This has been researched A LOT!!) But as usual, you get to decide for yourself now you are able to recognize the value of hard work.

Do you have any stories about work that you would like to share? If you could choose, when would you live? Would you live with modern technologies or back in the olden days? Did you have chores growing up? Did you like doing them? What has been your experiences with them?

As usual, keep on dancing!

💙

Emily