It’s Not Supposed to Be Easy
Eighty years ago tomorrow, the war in Europe ended.
Five years earlier, Winston Churchill stood before Parliament and said he had nothing to offer but “blood, sweat, and tears.”
That’s the quote we remember.
But it’s not what he said.
Churchill actually said: “Blood, toil, tears, and sweat.”
Toil.
That’s the word we’ve dropped. The word we don’t really use anymore.
It means pushing through fatigue, fear, and doubt. To work when no one’s watching. To keep pushing when quitting would be easier.
The people who won World War II were a generation that knew how to toil.
It wasn’t just soldiers. It was factory workers, designers, welders, planners. Ordinary Americans showed up, solved hard problems, and kept working even when it wasn’t perfect.
One of those Americans was industrialist Henry Kaiser, who helped organize the production of the Liberty ships. The ships that moved the Allied war effort.
To get the Liberty ships built, they refitted shipyards and created new ones from scratch. They figured out new ways of construction and welding.
The first Liberty ship, the SS Patrick Henry, took 244 days to build. Critics mocked the program and its progress. Time magazine even called them “ugly ducklings.”
But Kaiser and his team kept toiling. He said, “We see a greater America out there.” While the critics tapped away, writing stories of how long it took, detailing every setback, they kept toiling, kept working.
Soon, it took 100 days to build a ship.
Then 24 days.
They even built a ship in four days.
In the end, America built 2,710 Liberty ships, and they changed the course of the war.
“We see a greater America out there” became true because they built it.
Today, we’ve missed out on the word toil.
There’s been an iPhoneization of America where we expect to just tap and things happen.
Hungry? Tap, tap, tap. Food’s delivered to your door.
Need something? Tap, tap, tap. It arrives in 2 days or less.
Don’t like something? Tap, tap, tap. Leave a one-star review.
The problem is tapping feels like you’re working. But the real work that gets real things done still comes from toil. It comes from long hours spent figuring it out, trying, failing, and trying again.
And every generation has people who decide to toil.
They put a man on the moon. They built the screen you’re reading this on. They create breakthroughs in science, medicine, and AI.
Meanwhile, critics tap away and point out every failure. The media still loves to report every misstep. If it didn’t work the first time, they call it a failure.
But nothing hard worked the first time. It takes trial and error.
History is made by the people who toil. It’s usually reported on by the people who tap.
Every generation has people who see a greater America out there—and decide it’s worth the toil to build it.
Choose to be one of them.
Choose to toil.