On one level we rent apartments. Four walls and a roof: weathertight, an escape from the elements, shelter from the storm.
And while that is important, on another level——a more important level——we provide homes.
Homes are one of the most important things in people’s lives. Home is where you go to rest, to renew, to recharge. Home is a sanctuary, an emotional repository of many visceral feelings. To “strike home” is to go to the heart of a matter, to its core. “Home base” is the final goal, the most important destination. To “drive the point home” is to succeed, to make one’s point well. “Home office” refers to the main office, the center, the principal base of operations or activities. To be “at home” is to be relaxed and rested, comfortable and at ease.
There is the story of a passerby who asks three men working what they are doing. The first replies that he is laying bricks, the second that he is building a wall, the third replies with pride and enthusiasm that he is constructing a cathedral. Who has the greatest engagement, the greatest sense of accomplishment? Whose life is the most emotionally rich?
We are honored when people choose us to provide their homes. It is a responsibility we take seriously. We realize that we have a duty, an obligation, to our Residents, and we treat that duty with the greatest respect. Such a duty gives us the opportunity to enrich the lives of others and by doing so, enrich our own.
When we are entrusted with providing someone’s home——such a fundamental, vital portion of their lives——our livelihood becomes a noble profession, infused with deeper meaning and higher purpose. We cease laying bricks and become builders of cathedrals.
Have you been laying bricks lately? Or building cathedrals? In what ways can your livelihood enrich the lives of others and, in turn, yours?