It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I

In the age of champions, when men sought glory with fists and fire, the great Muhammad Ali—the poet of the ring, the prophet of confidence—spoke words that shimmered with both humility and power: “It’s just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.” At once simple and profound, these words stand as both a declaration of duty and a revelation of destiny. For Ali, boxing was not mere spectacle, but the natural expression of his being—an act as inevitable as the rising sun or the beating of the tide.

To call it “just a job” is to veil greatness in humility. Ali reminds us that every man, no matter how exalted, must labor in his own craft. The farmer tills the soil, the teacher shapes the mind, the builder lays the stone. For Ali, the work was combat—violent, yes, but noble when tempered by discipline and carried out within the sacred rules of the ring. His task was to beat people up, yet in this task he revealed artistry, rhythm, and poetry that transcended mere brutality. He spoke as if to say: do not be astonished at what I do, for it is as natural to me as breath.

This truth finds echo in the lives of the ancients. Consider Achilles, the peerless warrior of the Greeks. To him, battle was not foreign labor but the essence of his nature. Others planted fields or sailed ships; Achilles fought. And though his might was terrible, it was also inevitable, the way the lion hunts or the eagle soars. So too with Ali: he did not apologize for his fists, nor glorify them as monstrous. He framed them as nature itself, a part of the world’s order.

Yet Ali’s words also speak of acceptance. The grass does not resent its duty to grow, nor does the bird despair of flight. So too must each man accept his path, whether humble or exalted. Ali, in his wisdom, stripped away the illusions of fame and wealth to reveal the truth: boxing was his labor, his craft, his destiny. By embracing it fully, without shame or pride, he found freedom. He fought not as one enslaved to applause, but as one fulfilling the law written within his own being.

And yet, his words conceal another layer: the ordinariness of greatness. To the world, Ali was larger than life, a god among men. But to himself, he was simply fulfilling his role, doing his job as surely as the sea pounds the shore. In this, Ali teaches us that greatness does not come from striving to be extraordinary, but from embracing one’s purpose so completely that it becomes natural, inevitable, unstoppable.

We see this echoed in the story of Johann Sebastian Bach, who wrote music daily as though it were mere craft. To him, it was “just a job”—but his cantatas and fugues became eternal hymns of the soul. Like Ali, Bach revealed that true mastery is not in chasing glory, but in living one’s purpose as naturally as grass grows. Greatness flows not from striving for greatness, but from embracing one’s calling with constancy.

The lesson, then, is this: find your work, your calling, your destiny—and embrace it without vanity or shame. Do not measure yourself against applause or comparison. Instead, accept your path as part of the order of the world. If you are to teach, then teach; if you are to build, then build; if you are to fight, then fight. Let your labor be as natural as the waves upon the sand. For when a man lives his truth with this inevitability, greatness follows him as surely as shadow follows form.

So let the words of Muhammad Ali be carried into every heart: “Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.” Do not fear simplicity, for within it lies power. Do not fear your calling, however humble or fierce, for it was given to you for a reason. Accept it, live it, and let it flow from you as naturally as the forces of the earth. In such acceptance lies freedom, and in such freedom lies the path to glory.