What's in it for me?

I was staring at my blog just now, and noticing the quote in the margin. I was staring at the words "selfless service". In the past if you had asked me to comment on what I believed that meant, I would have expounded at length about what selflessness meant. Sometimes these days, my brain gets a bit stuck. It feels numb. I looked at the word selfless today, and I saw it as pretty self-explanatory. If you wanted me to teach a class on selfless service today, I would say this:

"There's nothing in it for you. You will work hard, and receive nothing in return. You will be tired, but there will still be more work to do. You will be discouraged, and no one will stop to encourage you. You will feel like you are failing, and yet you will keep trying. There is nothing in it for you."

I'm pretty much okay with that now, but it doesn't make me the life of the party oftentimes. I'm okay with that too. Being the life of the party is highly overrated. Last year around this time I injured my back. It was pretty bad. I couldn't even get myself to the toilet without breaking out in a cold sweat. I prayed to God, that if I could just get up and walk again, and get back to my work without the pain, I would be happy. And I am. I don't love always having my shoulder to the wheel, and being so tired it hurts. But I love that I can. I don't love that I am raising children that are largely unattached to any human being, and that they would just as soon be anywhere else but here. But I love that I can. I don't like that I find myself missing my husband and our relationship the way it used to be. But I love that I'm missing him, not resenting him.