Usefulness

By lach Diorne

Emerson once said, in writing of friendship: "Make yourself useful to someone."

That thought, more widely extended, more generally applied, would be good advice to every business man to begin a New Year with.

At this season every business man in whose bosom lurks even the smallest germ of ambition, is asking himself what 1927 will mean to him, what it will bring, what it will develop, what the final result will be so far as he is concerned, what Providence has in store for him during the year, etc.

Men of the more punchful sort-who have a better and more comprehensive viewpoint of man's stewardship and opportu4ity, are asking themselves the still more important question-"What can I do to help bring my ship in this year?" For THAT is the attitude, the state of mind, the condition of thinking, th4!-,prornises the most.

Not, what will the year bring to me, but rather, what can I do this year to make it better than other years.

And there is a good thought there in the quotation from Emerson, found above. Only make it read, 'Make yourself useful to more people." There isn't an5rthing finer you can do to help your business. The ordinary way of putting it would be to say, "Give more service this year."

But we have worked that service word so hard that it scarcely registers any rnore on the average human mentality. We have grown numb to its impression. But when you say, "Make yourself useful," it registers in good shape.

The lumber business is essentially a business of usefirlness. There is probably no other line of business that can more truthfully say-"I am useful!'-1t13s the lumber business. Food and shelter are the primal qeeds of man. The lumber business is the original shelter department.

But its usefulness will be large or small very much in proportion to the effort YOU make to develop that effect. Think over your business, your territoryr /our trade, and your prospects. Are you serving them in the most useful way possible? Are you doing all for them that you can do? How can you improve your usefulness? How can you render truer and more esteemed benefits than you have been rendering? How can you make yourself and your business more USEFUL to everyone around you?

NOT just a lumber yard, or a building store, a sawmill, or a factory? But an institution of actual USE and SERVICE and practical HELP. That's what S E R V I C E really meansb Let's make the lumber business more useful in L927; and when the year ends our returns will undoubtedly be in proportion to.our efrorts in that direction.