Monday, February 20, 2006

Advice for Traveling Workers 3

A continuation of an incredibly wise excerpt from the papers of John R. Mott regarding wise living during frequent business travel.

Part 1

Part 2

III. Let Us Religiously Keep a Weekly Rest Day

If this is not made a matter of religion all experience of our workers shows that it will not be done at all. If we are so situated that we cannot observe the same day each week. Let us preserve the average of one day in seven at all costs, and make the interval between rest days as nearly six as possible. I have found from experience that it is a help to keep a written record in my pocket notebook of dates of rest days, of places where they were spent, and how they were spent. It is desirable, and sometimes necessary, to spend the day away from the place where we have been working. Let us not use it as time to catch up on business correspondence or reports. Let us not use it as a day of railway travel. It is necessary not only to burn the bridges behind us, but also not to go swimming in the stream which skirts our regular work.

To make this day what it should be it is necessary that we make plans for it, and that these plans include some strong diversion. Each man must determine his own plans and must make them so flexible that they may be adapted to the environment in which his general program places him. Sleep longer than usual. Spend much more time than usual in exercise in the open air. We should get next to nature and fall in with her spirit and ways and laws. Devote from two to four hours to general reading and to study according to some plan. Do not count as lost an absolutely idle hour now and then. If the rest day falls on the Sabbath let us fall in with the observances and purpose of the day.

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