Summary Of Putting Our Hearts Into Our Stations By Quentin Schultze

As young college students we often have jobs that are customer service oriented. We can all relate to what Quentin Schultze is saying in the section “Putting Our Hearts into Our Stations” we he says “My first paid job was cleaning and restocking shelves in a family drugstore. After one week, I had mastered the work and grown bored (Schultze 37).” This is so relatable to me. Growing up in Puerto Rico, I’ve been working since the early age of 14 and even before then I helped out my mother with her business and my grandparents at their farm. My very first job outside of my family was as an office aid at a human resource department, I felt very lucky being so young, surrounded by adults in their fancy suits. Little did I know the title office aid
was flexible and included having me fetch the entire office breakfast and lunch in different restaurants throughout the city. Needless to say after the first day I never wore heels to work again.
Although I built a very strong work ethic from that I quickly outgrew it and it took a long talk from my grandmother to have me humble myself. My grandmother always said that work should be a rewarding thing (what she actually said sounds way more inspiring in spanish,) but it was very similar to what Schultze says “Our labor need not be impressive, but it is most gratifying when it contributes to others’ well-being. Nearly all working has potential,” so I learned to make the most out of what felt like a minuscule thing I was doing. And I learned to see other’s work as something valuable.
Schultze’s section titled “Avoiding riches and prestige,” talks about how even the most service-oriented occupations aren’t wholehearted as God wants. This section reminded me of an organization I used to volunteer at. For the longest time I thought I was raising money for orphan’s in Haiti. The first red flag was when the owner asked me if I wanted to buy school supplies for me and my son to let him know and he would give me this card that non profits get to not pay taxes. I said something along the lines of “but the supplies aren’t for the orphans” and he said it was okay and he was just trying to help I just said “no thank you, I don’t really spend that much on supplies anyway.” But I couldn’t help but wonder what else he was using that card for. Later on I was invited on a mission trip to Haiti and I was very excited, I was going to do something for class regarding my trip and I needed the address of the orphanage. The owner told me there was no orphanage that the kids were needy but they lived with their parents. I was just very upset and left the organization all together after that. This man who was apparently a minister, had proven to be dishonest, twice! I was not about to give him my money for a Haiti mission trip and possible end up on a boat in Hong Kong. He wasn’t trustworthy, he wasn’t wholehearted. The experience was definitely eye-opening.