Knowledge Work vs. Manual Labor

I can still recall the disdain my blue collar father had for the whole concept of working with your brain rather than your hands. For him it was the old country's mantra that you need to physically make something with your work . . . and also I suspect firmly rooted in suspicion that knowledge-work was simply not work at all . . . it was a life of leisure from where his aching back stood. I endured these slants on my character and snide remarks about working only one day a week for years. When my folks came to visit us once where I was pastoring a church in northeastern PA, I made it a point to take my father with me for a day in the office. That day started at 8:00 am at the local hospital . . . ran wide open all day in people-intensive situations . . . and ended at 9:30 pm that evening after finishing the Wednesday evening prayer/discipleship time and people hanging around talking until finally the last straggler eager for pastoral attention had gone home. Dad and I walk over to the parsonage, he fell into my favorite recliner and said, "I am exhausted!" Not surprisingly, I have never heard another snide comment about the ease and leisure of knowledge-work since.

David Allen, the guru of relaxed super productivity said some really important things about knowledge work vs. manual labor:

"Work no longer has clear boundaries. A major factor in the mounting stress level is that the actual nature of our jobs has changed much more rapidly than have our training for and our ability to deal with work." He goes on and gives some extensive commentary on how our work, is "knowledge work" (a Peter Drucker phrase) and that it is never done. You can find this section of his book on page 33-34 in the ebook version. (Also Jeff Singfiel on his "Missionary Geek" blog has written about Allen's work, you can click a link to his website above and to the right)

I write this as I am trying to find margin in life . . . a sustainable pace for the long haul that is functional . . . and with the twin pressures of an urgent task and leaders over me who want more production of a variety that fits their understanding of the task. I do not think I am having much success in finding this illusive margin. But at least my dad doesn't rag me about this being an easy job any longer.