(excerpt from Vaughn J. Featherstone’s book: The Millennial Generation—leading today’s youth into the future, 1999,  p.113)

                Work is essential.  Missionary service is hard work—mentally, spiritually, and
          physically.  It is demanding.  Every laborer knows that work requires discipline.  Teach our
          youth to look for things that need to be done and then to do them.  Even youth who have
          never worked outside the home can be taught the discipline of work by looking for things
          that need to be done.  What if a young man or woman decided to see how much work there
          was around the house and systematically did it!  Let’s list a few chores that he or she might
          find:  mow and edge the lawn, plant and care for vegetable and flower gardens, clean the
          garage, and organize tools; repair doors, screens, electrical plugs, sprinklers, and fences;
          paint sidings, fences, trim, the garage, and outdoor furniture; wash and iron the clothes;
          scrub and clean the floors, windows, basins, toilets, tub, and showers; wash the dishes,
          clear the table, prepare meals; drive the younger children to meetings, games, piano
          lessons; go grocery shopping; vacuum floors, sweep walks; care for pets; and so on.

             Can you see the opportunities parents have available for training their children?  If the older
     young men in the family knew that all of the work they were doing was in preparation for a mission, it
     would become a glory and not drudgery.  Mental work requires even more discipline.  Young people
     can study the scriptures, read great literature, and memorize poetry, scriptures, inspirational sayings,
     even the missionary discussions.  Again, it will not be drudgery if they understand it is part of
     missionary preparation.

              All work, mental and physical, builds character, stability, confidence, and self-esteem.  Work is a
     marvelous part of life; it is fulfilling and rewarding.  Wildred Petersen, in his Art of Living series makes
     no distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his
     education and his recreation, his love and his religion.  He hardly knows which is which.  He simply
     pursues with excellence what he is about and leaves others to determine whether he is working or
     playing.  He, himself, always knows he is doing both.”

              Possibly the hardest work in the world is being lazy.  Time moves so slowly—a second, a minute,
     an hour—that life simply drags by.  Those who avoid work carry the heavy weight of nonperformance
     and dullness of character; they most often find themselves depressed.  Laziness becomes a way of life
     and saps the manhood or womanhood out of the soul.  To work is to save oneself, to bring credit for
     achievement, to ear one’s way, and to fill a role in the community.  Also, the person who knows hard
     work is usually blessed with hard sleep.  Our youth need to know that you have to earn deep, sweet,
     peaceful, repairing sleep.