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About this quote

What does it mean?
The services people need most are often the ones we dislike doing, and being paid for them can make us feel less than human.
In plain terms
We often get paid for work we find demeaning.
What can you take from it?
Find dignity beyond the tasks you are paid for.

Where it applies

  • customer service jobs
  • mandatory chores
  • low-status work

Putting it to work

  • reframe the value of the work
  • seek respectful roles

Questions to consider

  • Why do we devalue certain work?
  • Can dignity be found in any job?

Another view

Some essential services are inherently valuable despite personal dislike.

More from Henry David Thoreau

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  2. As for my own business, even that kind of surveying which I could do with most satisfaction my employers do not want. They would prefer that I should do my wor…

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  3. Most men would feel insulted, if it were proposed to employ them in throwing stones over a wall, and then in throwing them back, merely that they might earn th…

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