Sometimes, during lunch when I am working the counter and am an hour or more into the rush and I have repeated myself non-stop — what kind of bread, or meat, or cheese, or beverage — answering the same questions over and over, I find myself unprepared for the person who walks up with a chip on her shoulder or a problem in life that she has decided to somehow offload unto me. Maybe she’s rude or unnecessarily condescending. Perhaps she takes delight in putting me lower or adding to my stress load with excessive requests. In my head, I am screaming that I am more than the apron I’m wearing while trying to remain polite.

The problem is that if I think I am more than the apron, I am not.

Part of blooming where you are planted is first understanding that you are planted.

I heard a story today.

Someone had a job that required some things of her that were not to her liking, and she chose to cloak her wounded pride and displeasure in the claim that her talents were being wasted. The work was beneath her and surely she could be better used elsewhere.

I know that song and dance.

I’m always somewhere in between it in my perpetual struggle to find work that is fulfilling. Not being married or with family means that my work life is a significant source of self-worth, whether I want to admit that flaw or not. Not having those same commitments also means I am often able to move on to another job and try again, to try and find a job where I get the respect I think I deserve.

That is pride, and not the useful kind.

It’s not the manifestation of useful pride that understands starting at the bottom and knowing I have what it takes to move up. It’s not the useful pride found in doing a good job, whatever that might be, instead of taking pride in the job title. It’s not the useful pride that understands paying my dues, patience, and the reality that every job teaches something necessary for whatever the next step is. It’s not the useful pride that understands the cycle from Freshman to Senior is repeated, never-ending.

If I can’t complete the stage I am at and instead use pride to find a way out of a job I think beneath me, I will never move through life in the things that really matter in any way but horizontally. I will never rise above.

I understand that some jobs are a poor fit; we are not all suited for all jobs. Sometimes you have to take a job because you need the money. There is no shame in honest work.

Still, I, like everyone, have to find a way to feel like I am meaningfully contributing somehow to something larger than myself and not just punching a clock; at the same time, I need to find a way to remain humble. I need to be willing to serve and not associate my personal worth as being less because my job might require me to eat humble pie for a long period of time.

I get that.

Humble pie is bitter.

It’s hard to wait.

Sometimes, I might say I wasn’t being challenged. It might be a conflict with a boss or co-worker. It might be an atmosphere that I cannot function well in, much less find a way to contribute meaningfully to. I might not appreciate having to start at the bottom all over again, thinking that I’d already paid my dues.

Sometimes these things are true, sometimes not.

A job might not challenge me all the time in the creative ways that spark excitement and growth or use my education and obvious talents. It might challenge me only through how it forces me to work through the stresses of working with customers. It might ask me to exercise the weaker areas of myself rather than rely on obvious talents that are already strong.

Whatever the case, I’ve struggled to find the reason for my constant dissatisfaction with my jobs over the past decade, never fully happy to admit the common denominator is me.

My job is what I make it.

My faith prods me with the reminder that as a follower of Christ, serving is a privilege. Serving is an honor. Serving is humble and yet, the highest goal. All of the beatitudes tell me that no job is too menial, or beneath me and my talents. It is one thing to waste your talents, and another to idolize them. I can use my talents in art and music, and still scrub floors. Just because I don’t earn a living off of my talents doesn’t mean I’m wasting them. I can still enjoy them without a wage.

Maybe I can’t bake for a king, but I could bake for my family. Maybe I don’t write for the world, but I could write a letter to a friend.

Do I need an audience or a paycheck for my talents to count?

Not everyone is a follower of Christ. The servant aspect would make little sense, though the reality of hard work and taking pride in a job well done would have merit. Some might instead suggest to a person who is unwilling to start at the bottom that you work to earn money and if it’s money you need then it’s work you will do. That you get your foot in the door. That you pull yourself up, suck it up, get to work, and stop your bitchin’.

It made me angry to hear this story of someone complaining their talents were being wasted. In that situation, I saw a person too proud and too foolish to understand that in life, we don’t get to keep our place. Sometimes we lose it and have to go to the end of the line, and sometimes we never get up the line at all and that’s just the hand we’re dealt.

The talents of waiting, of patience, of humility, of looking out for others first? Very rare indeed.

It made me angry to hear this story, because I recognize that pride in me; I saw it for how ugly it was.