Finally Finishing--A Paragraph a Day

What a relief it is to finally finish a job that I've been working on a while.  After a leaking dishwasher ruined our floor, I've spent the last couple of weeks tearing out an old floor (which meant taking off the molding and door frames, of course), cleaning up the mold and glue, shopping for new flooring and underlayment, and actually putting in the floor and installing a new dishwasher.  It's been a lot of work, but what a great feeling it is to be able to say, "It's done."  If there's any sort of argument for perseverance that's super strong, it's the fact that the feeling we get when we finish something that's been difficult is a truly beautiful feeling, one of accomplishment and pride and all sort of other stuff mixed together.  When I rode my bike 400 miles in June, the feeling that I had when I rode into the town that was my final destination was incredible.  And the feeling happened only because I persevered and made it all the way--it couldn't have happened any other way.  I know quite a few people who almost never feel that way because they so often give up before they finish what they started, and I feel very bad for them.  There's a chance that they're building habits that will never allow them to actually finish something that's a long-term project, so there's a chance that they'll never experience the feeling of having persevered and accomplished something that they set their minds to.  Personally, I try to remind myself of the value of perseverance as much as I can because I definitely want to keep feeling that feeling.