Mind Your Business

Mind Your Own Business

As a child, pestering my older siblings as younger siblings are want to do, I can recall being told, “Mind your own business.”

Perhaps you also heard that refrain from your playmates or even from your parents, teachers or other adults when you interjected yourself into situations that did not concern you.

I believe that it is actually very good advice. The First Continental Congress certainly thought so. When the first penny coin minted by that august body was struck in 1787, it bore the motto “Mind Your Business”. What sage advice to the citizens of the fledgling nation.

At that time, the ink on the U.S. Constitution was barely dry and the document not yet ratified by the States. Much work was to be done to secure the safety and organizational integrity of the nascent Republic.

It was a time when each Citizen could best serve their country by minding their own business; as a farmer, blacksmith, sawyer, cobbler, printer, baker, or candlestick maker. The products and services of each one, produced with integrity and competence, were required for their well being and the well being of their neighbors. The commerce that would ensue with the exchange of these goods and services would enable them to lay the foundation of a country that would later cover nearly an entire continent and lead the world in many ways.

At some point, things went awry. The causes for this and the subsequent costs incurred are beyond the scope of this missive.

But truth remains true despite the actions of men or nations to the contrary. And the truth is that the admonition to mind your own business did not originate in 1787 with the Continental Congress.

1 Thessalonians 4:11-12 (in the Bible)reads:

“11…make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, 12 so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.” (NIV)

There are five real good bits of advice there:

• “Lead a quiet life.” Don’t strive to be noticed. Stay “under the radar.” “Fools’ names, like fools’ faces, are often seen in public places.”( Thomas Fowler)

• “Mind your own business” This would seem to be common sense, but then, “common sense is not so common.” (Voltaire)

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt." (Abraham Lincoln)

• “Work with your hands.” Be busy doing something productive that will earn the respect of others.

• Don’t “be dependent on others.” Ultimately you become the chattel of the entity you rely on.

Maybe we would do well to re-instate "Mind Your Business" as our National Motto.

Think about it.