Uncommon Sense

By John Blake

Your Brain Will Loaf If You Let It[1]

Idle brains soon rust.  Rusty brains soon become wholly useless.   Your brain like any other man’s, will loaf if you let it.  And if it is allowed to loaf very much, it will soon become helpless. 

All exertion must be forced.  Sit down beside a brook or beneath a tree, and your brain will slump into idleness without any trouble at all.  Sit down to a task, and unless you force it to work, it will idle.  Once started, it will keep at work of its own accord.  But it takes effort to start it.  And that effort must be supplied by your will.

Even after it begins to function, it will often wander away toward idleness.  It is difficult to concentrate because of the tendency of the mind to occupy itself with other things besides the task in hand.  But nothing useful or profitable can be accomplished without concentration.  The mind that yields to every distraction, that is always figuratively running to the window to see what is going on outside, is never a productive mind.

Your body is subservient to your will.  You can force your legs to climb hills long after they are tired.  You can force your hands to continue at a task, when, left to themselves they would seize the first opportunity to stop and rest.  Your mind will quit as soon as your hands and legs if you let it.  It is even harder to drive than your muscles.  But you must learn to drive it.  You must make it understand that when it begins a task it must keep at that task till it is accomplished, or on the way to accomplishment.  You must make it capable of sustained effort—of working day after day till what it is trying to do has been done.  Do that at the beginning and the mind will soon learn that loafing is not to be done, just as a naturally lazy horse can be taught that it is no good to try to loaf.

Develop your will to its fullest power.  Make it drive your mind.  And presently you will discover that your mind is doing its own driving.  When that time comes you can tackle any job with a fair assurance of getting it done.  For the mind that works hard can accomplish wonders—far more that its owner ever dreamed it could accomplish when he began his work.   (Copyrighted, 1920)

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[1] The copyright date of this article helps our timeline of Clare’s book.  Clare was now about 18 years old.