It is while you are patiently toiling at the little tasks of life that the meaning and shape of the great whole of life dawn on you.

The saying argues that life’s larger purpose is not usually revealed through grand events but through sustained attention to small responsibilities. “Patiently toiling” highlights endurance and humility: meaning “dawns” gradually as a byproduct of faithful practice. Brooks implies that the “great whole” is apprehended retrospectively and organically—formed by habits, service, and incremental growth—rather than seized by sudden insight. The quote also carries a moral theology of work: ordinary tasks become the arena where character is shaped and where one’s place in a larger moral or spiritual order becomes intelligible.