Or…The Linchpin Trilogy!

Heaven By Way of a Map – Part I

How’s that for a title?!

I thought over the next week or so I would write a couple of articles, and maybe throw in a couple of videos about what is is really like to come back from The Dark Side…the side of life so many are running away from every day. Running with a part of themselves still anchored in that old mindset and that old life.

Those are difficult shackles to break and the scars of the chains will perhaps remain forever.

Will they last for the remainder of my life? It is hard to say!

Most of us were raised with a certain mindset, some of it a carryover from The Great Depression thinking of our grandparents and great grandparents.

And some of it, a consequence of the old school Horatio Alger Rags to Riches mythology so many bought into with no real map for how to do anything more than grow up, go to college, get a job, get married, have 2 or 3 or 4 kids (I have a funny story for later on about that), place money in a retirement account, watch it grow (slowly), work for the same company for our entire adult lives, wait for retirement, play with our grandkids, perhaps travel a bit (on less than we struggled to live on for the last 50 years – I don’t think so), and die!

Scary…but true!

So, I thought I would share a bit of how I unshackled and my thoughts about the experience over the next few days.

Will it have to do with entrepreneurship?

A little.

Will is have to do with inbound marketing?

Only in that it is my life raft, my way out.

But more than that, it is a signal of a shift in the fundamental mindset of millions of people who are saying in one way or another:

I am mad as hell and I’m not going to take it any more!

So, on with the show!

This is an opening act. Throughout this week I will share a bit of the old thinking and some of the new; and, what it took to get here.

If it helps one person break free, or even consider breaking free, it will have been a success!

Let me know what you think!

Share your thoughts and comments below…not only for me but for everyone who stops here from time to time.

Thanks!

I slept in this morning…until noon! The old Me, still firmly entrenched after 55 years, generated more than a twinge of guilt! Old habits (and “Mes”) die hard!

The new me is sitting here in my gym shorts and a cut off t-shirt…happily typing away!

Connie is at work, she works because with my medical history no one else will insure us and, with our medical system, if we don’t have insurance and I get sick again…well, you know the rest.

Not surprisingly, TuffGuy and Bart could care less what I have on. Nor does my keyboard give a half a hoot!

But I can still hear one of my first employer saying:

“Selling is like shaving! If you don’t do it every day you’re a bum!”

Talk about a mindset sticking around!

35 years later and I can still hear his words!

Norm was a nice man who had a lot of sayings like that. He took me under his wing and allowed me to spread my wings as a salesman when no one was hiring anyone for a sales position without experience.

At that time, I was focused on one thing…making it big!

A good sales job was one of the quickest routes to “The Good Life.“

And at the time I was all for that!

Funny how we get for what we ask for and it comes back to bite us in the “butt.”

We spend years of our lives, ransoming out bits and pieces of our Selves.

And for what?

Security?

Security is an illusion!

The only security any of us have is between our ears!

The only value we offer is in what we do, how we do it, and the difficulty someone or some entity (i.e., company) has in replacing us.

In other words, Seth Godin’s words, becoming a Linchpin.

This idea isn’t new…but it certainly seems to be generating a lot of excitement.

You see, doing something extraordinary is so rare, and to many so inconceivable, that is the surest way to true “security,” whatever that means; and, if that’s what you’re after.

But it takes creating your own vision, you own map, and then having the courage to strike out on what can be an amazing journey of discovery.

But you need your own map and you need to “ship!”

In other words, you need to act…and act with a plan!

The problem has always been that we are either working from someone else’s map, a map going nowhere, or no map at all.

Sadly, the latter is usually the case.

Striking out on your own journey is frightening, nerve wracking, and wonderful.

You may feel free for the first time in your life.

Truly free!

At the very least, you will be a lot happier.

And maybe, you’ll even get to spend Mondays doing exactly what you want for as long as you want in whatever garb strikes your fancy!

Nice thought, huh?!

So, today is day one, every day is day one, and I slept in this morning…until noon!

I will write all day today, as I am at this moment, I hope it makes a difference in someone’s life…it is certainly making a difference in mine.

Make your own map. Set a course and then set out on your own journey.

And here’s the key, no matter how powerful the Old Me is, he or she will weaken!

Just never look back and never deviate from your plan!

Course corrections?

To be sure!

But focus on your map and have an amazing journey!

Life is too short to waste it following someone else’s map…live your own life!

Please share your thoughts, ideas…your story!

Thank you for taking a bit of time to read my thoughts.

You are appreciated!

John Zajaros
The Ultimate Internet Image
Lakewood, Ohio
216-712-7004

Life Lesson: You Can Change the Spots on a Leopard!

I had an interesting experience the other day and I thought I would share something with you. Yes, this is yet another life lesson. My life seems filled with life lessons, many I’ve learned the hard way.

Other life lessons have come back at me at the strangest times and in the most unexpected ways. I suppose it’s a consequence of aging, at least in the sense that I am a bit more introspective and a lot more observant.

I have become a student of people, the people around me, how they behave, and how they interact. It is always interesting and a continuous source of knowledge and entertainment.

Who’d a thunk?

People watching leading to incredibly instructive Life Lessons? But it happens every day. You simply have to be open and receptive to Life, capital L, going on all around you!

Connie, my wife, is always smiling when we are out and about because: 1) She is a very happy person; and, 2) because she knows what I am doing most of the time and is amused by it.

Yes, I watch people! All kinds of people doing all sorts of things. I watch everything from the incredibly boring to the absolutely ridiculous and on to the really awesome…and I love it.

I take it all in, every Life Lesson, every morsel.

You see, for the majority of my life I kept people at arm’s length. I was likable but not really liked, I was successful without feeling like a success, and I was utterly and completely mystified by peoples’ reactions to me. Not the people who interacted with me for a moment, not the people I worked for and who signed my paychecks, not the people I was selling something to, they all liked me. I am talking about the people I worked with day in and day out, they are the ones I kept at arm’s length.

I never really connnected with them…nor did I want to.

I just didn’t have time for them and I certainly didn’t have the time to nurture friendships or relationships. I had a lot of acquaintances and virtually no friends. That may sound callous, and even a bit sad, and I suppose it was. It was the nature of the business or businesses I was in and how I was brought up.

I invested heavily in my family but beyond that I built a wall.

Life Lesson and Advice (good and bad)

My grandfather, a self-made multi-millionaire who started out as an elevator boy in the GM building, in Detroit, and went on to sit on the board of directors once said this to me:

“Don’t trust anything unless you see it in writing…and then doubt it. Don’t trust anyone, not even me!”

“Not even me!”

That was my grandfather who I worshipped and who I respected. That blew back my hair a bit. But he had made it! What was good for Gramps was certainly good enough for me. So became that person, a Type A Driver.

Never trust anyone?

“OK Gramps!”

Gramps’ Advice and Success In Business

From that point forward, in all and anything I did, I was the guy. And, if I wasn’t, I was busting my tail to get there. I was the top guy in the company or I tortured myself and everyone else until I got there.

I was making 5 figures a month and 6 figures a year by the time I was 23 years of age. I had a nice home and a 25′ Ericson sailboat. I bought the sailboat even though I had never been on a sailboat in my life. I had a Honda 1000 Goldwing motorcycle before I had a license to ride on it. I always had 2 new cars in the driveway, in addition to the one I got free from the company.

It was all paid for, cash!

Success!

Yes, I was a success, at least my parents thought so.

My Mom loved the local press I received and my Dad actually said he was proud of me for the first time in my life. That, in spite of being an Eagle Scout, junior class president in high school, a 3-letter winner in sports, student council representative, first chair in the symphonic band, the Top Teen named by the local, weekly Cleveland newspaper, a US Army veteran, a Life Member of the Disabled American Veterans, and a whole lot more.

None of that mattered!

It was the sailboat, the house, the motorcycle, the cars and all that defined success in my world, and that of my parents and grandparents…so I pursued the trappings of success.

And I hated every minute of it!

I hated working for someone else. I would eventually strike out on my own.

I hated sales. Swore I would never sell again in my life. Little did I know!

I hated the fact that I hadn’t finished college after discharge. So I went back.

And, I hated that I felt doomed to do what I hated for the rest of my life! Every day, each and every day I loathed the position I was in and felt helpless to do anything about it…so I worked harder, pressed harder, drove harder!

Was I a success?

Sure, just ask anyone!

Was I a success?

Not if you asked me, not if I was honest with you…but that was a stretch, at least back then. But deep down I was in pain, as much as any physical pain I had ever suffered.

The Good, The Bad, and The Driver

So, let’s stay in the mid-to-late ’70s. The economy was booming. The Jimmy Carter recession hadn’t taken hold yet, devastating much of the country and forever transforming the Midwest.

Life was good in the USA…for most anyway.

I was out of the US Army, a disabled veteran, young, married, cocky with a great job (public perception) and a rosy future.

And I was a Driver!

Meaning, I was not only a Type A personality. I was driven!

While the theory of the Type A and B personality has come under scrutiny over the years (its inception in the 1950s), most people still know what you mean when you refer to someone as a Type A personality.

Well, I was Type A on steroids! As stated, what I and many of my friends and associates called a Driver!

Forget about the controversy since its inception, if I walked up to you as a twenty-something young man, you would immediately know several things about me:

1) I exuded a sense of urgency, even impatience when it came to time…particularly wasted time. I got right to the point and immediately down to business. While this caused irritation and even exasperation in others, I also felt those emotions myself…constantly! Time was money and money was time. There was time for one thing…making more money!

2) There was a kind of hostility just beneath the surface, what some have referred to as free floating hostility. But it was more irritation triggered by a sense of urgency and the need to get everything done…yesterday.

3) I was super competitive and this made me goal-oriented to the point of obsession. Achievement, and being recognized by others for that achievement, was an integral part of my personality. I loved the accolades and placed undue stress upon myself; and, that stress carried over into everything I did because regardless of what it was, I had to be the best at it. Period!

Remarkably, there are still employers today who would read that and say, “So? What’s the problem?”

Well, this was great for my employers. I was driven and I worked 80 hours a week on straight commission.

Loved the money, hated the pressure, never told a soul.

As stated, it was great for my employers and it was also fantastic for my clients. I was always working without a net, early on for someone else; and, later for myself. I was motivated to deliver nothing but the best service, to be the best producer, the top salesman in the company, in the country, or the world.

As a marketing consultant? There was only outbound marketing at that time…although it was not called outbound marketing. I was the guy who brought in the biggest clients, kept them the longest, generated new revenue streams and referrals, wrapped everything up quickly so we could move on.

And then:

Close! Close! Close!

And so on, day after day, week after week, etc, etc, etc….

I can hear Yul Brenner in The King and I when I write that:

“etc…etc…etc…”

If you’ve seen the movie Instinct with Donald Sutherland and Cuba Gooding, Jr. (good movie BTW, especially for a physical anthropologist with an interest in primatology) this will sound familiar:

I worked very hard to make sure all the right people liked me and that I was always at the top of the heap. Mattered to whom? To me and to those who could impact my future, my upward mobility…and my bank balance.

Not a pretty picture, is it?

Yet this type of person, particularly in sales, marketing, certain aspects of the law, some brokerage firms, and in some sports, was not only valued, they (we) were all but deified. Amazingly, in some of life’s arenas they still are!

OK! Getting back to the Life Lesson and the reason for this post.

I ran into myself the other morning, that other self, that self from years ago…and it was interesting.

I have a friend whose husband is me, at least me 30 years ago, and it took me back in an instant.

Interestingly, I have recently come to know several Type A businessmen, some as friends, most as acquaintances (their choice), many now retired. These retired, Type A businessmen seem to be forever stuck in that mode, that miserable, self-loathing, Type A Driver mode…and it is very sad!

You know something, the guy I’m talking about? I did not like him, not at all.

The saddest part?

He is probably right where I was way back then…self-loathing, feeling trapped. Or, it may be too soon, he may still be in love with the power and the idea of becoming a “Success!”

One thing is certain, he is me and I was him.

Scary!

Life Lesson: Breaking Free

What did it take for me to break the mold?

Was I doomed to this sort of driven behavior?

Was it part of my makeup, my personality, as so many would argue…hardwired from inception?

From birth?

“You can’t change the spots on a leopard”…or so they say.

Hence the Life Lesson!

I almost lost my life and in almost losing my life, in brushing with the ultimate reality, I discovered myself, my true self…and saved my life.

I am talking about my real life, the only life worth saving…because that other person had died inside a very long time ago.

I had actually started down the path to self-awareness in the mid-80s.

I had a brush with a very serious, often life-threatening illness and spend 12 weeks in one of the best hospitals in the Midwest. I was transferred there after a few weeks at a local hospital, the local hospital totally inept and unable to diagnose the illness. Interestingly, it took the “better” hospital just 48 hours to diagnose the illness and then a few more weeks to beat it.

Like anything, there are good and bad providers, there are experts and then there are experts.

I was lucky…I would be lucky again a decade later.

Interestingly, that second brush with death (the first was in 1972, the third in 1998-2008) put me on the road I am on now. That experience, facing my own mortality, allowed me enough time to disengage and to realize I was not doomed.

I discovered that my life had not been set on an unalterable course, and that what I had been told from the very beginning of my life, from its inception, was wrong!

I should and in fact had to change the course of my life…or I wouldn’t make it.

I almost didn’t!

So, I went back to school. I graduated summa cum laude, went on to study for my doctorate, and the competitive spirit lead me to immerse myself in something I loved. I found out that it was OK to be driven, as long as whatever was driving you was something you loved, something you had a passion for, something you actually could take control of and ultimately become part of and contribute to.

I guess I became a different sort of driver, one in control of my life and how it unfolded…instead of being someone else’s trained seal, performing to someone else’s tune, and living some else’s definition of success.

How awful!

Yes, I agree with the 12 Steppers of AA, NA, and CA…control is an illusion. But there are degrees of control. Ultimate control is beyond our grasp, there are too many variables to control.

However, if you love your life, what you are doing and who you are sharing it with…the rest seems to flow.

Life Lesson: Are there bumps?

Certainly!

Ultimately, the new life is a cakewalk compared to the old life, the life of a Type A driver, the life of a success, particularly someone else’s idea of success.

Life Lesson: You do have choices to make and regardless of how deeeep you are in it, (the ending of and the variation of a four letter word) you can always extricate yourself from misery and from a life that has gotten away from you.

You get a do-over !

Life Lesson: In my case, it took a Higher Power, a Supreme Being, God, Infinite Intelligence, and Obi-Wan Kenobi, or whatever you believe in, to take their fist and slap me up side the head and clear my thinking and my vision long enough to see the person looking back at me in the mirror.

The person I saw looking back at me the other day was not in the mirror, it was a real person, and he was an early 3o-something high powered, Type A Driver…and I didn’t like him…because I didn’t like me at that stage in my life.

How could I?

Success and Life Lessons: If you look in the mirror and the person looking back at you is someone you don’t recognize, or someone you simply cannot face, then you have failed.

Get busy!

Recreate your Self and your Life before you are on your death bed, as Sam Walton was, uttering those sadly tragic words:

“I blew it!“

If that isn’t the ultimate Life Lesson…I don’t know what is?

If people don’t look forward to your company, if you are annoyed in and by the presence of others, impatient and controlling? Rethink the direction of your life before it is too late, before you are gone. Because, there is indeed one instance when you can’t change the spots of a leopard (or your stars)…and that is in the last moments of life.

Do you want to remember an amazing life and be remembered as someone who was empathetic, compassionate, caring, loving, and giving?

Or do you want to be thought of as a Driver?

Life Lesson? I am glad I ran into that young man and I am sorry for him. He has a long journey ahead and, unfortunately, it will take an incredibly powerful force, event, or series of events to change the trajectory of his life!

Life Lesson: It can be done! I did it. He can do it. So can you!

The payoff is incredible!

I love my life now…and to think I almost didn’t make it!

You can too! But it is up to you and it takes desire, self-awareness, honesty…and a mirror!

Good luck to you!

John

Life Lessons: The Ultimate Question?
How do you want to live and define your life?

Throughout our lives we are faced with many decisions, some of them are very difficult and present themselves at crucial points along the way. Many of the decisions we are faced with will ultimately shape and define the course of our lives; and, the become life lessons!

These choices, when they present themselves, are almost never easy and usually have to do with a price that must be paid, at times a high price, in order to achieve a certain goal or result. In most cases, the result or goal we are seeking is something we must trade for, something we will receive in return for something we must give of ourselves….and others, directly or indirectly.

In other words, in order to achieve the goal or goals we view to be so important, we may have to pay a heavy price.

Interestingly, the decisions we must make and the commitments we are required to make along with them, for goals we are (or were) actively pursuing, goals we had determined to be essential to our overall success in life, may not be the same decisions and/or commitments we would make in retrospect, with the added 20/20 perspective only hindsight can provide.

Not only do many of the goals seem unimportant once we achieve them, we may also question the decision making that went into such a quest to begin with.

Once again, many of these goals come at a significant cost, not only to ourselves, but also to those we love and care for.

I am often reminded of the saying:

Be careful what you ask for, you just might get it!

This is so true!

Significantly, many of the career and life goals we set out to achieve early in our careers, the goals we set for ourselves and for our family, come at too high a price.

In many instances, when faced with the ultimate question:

Success at what price?

Many would be unwilling to pay the price if they knew then what they only come to know much later.

Goals and Material Things

This is particularly true when the goals in life are linked to material goods or “things.” Many of the “things” we attach so much significance to when we are young just do not appear to have the same value later in life. Many of the material “things” are generally not worth the price that must be paid by ourselves and those we love to attain, achieve, and/or acquire them.

This realization is generally viewed from a perspective of time and proximity!

In other words, the closer we get to whatever it is we once believed to crucial to our success, the achievement of a goal that will in some way define us and transform our lives, and those of our loved ones, the more likely we are to see it in an entirely different light.

Additionally, the more severe the cost, particularly in terms of the human cost, trading our time (our absence) for an object or a gratifying moment, the less apt we would be to pay for it had we to do it over again.

Think for a moment about that before getting defensive and saying “You are just being negative!”

Do you know what Sam Walton’s last 3 words were?

One of the most “successful” men on the planet and the founder of Wal-Mart said this:

“I blew it!”

Thanks to my friend Marc Warnke, author of Family First Entrepreneurship (awesome book about time, proximity, and family!) for that video!

What we have invested in, usually our blood, sweat, tears, and time may no longer seem important…or even appropriate given time and proximity.

Perhaps an example will help!

In 1984 I got a job with an advertising and marketing company and immediately went to a solid 6 figure income. I had just walked away from a business I founded and still owned part of because I had become the Dunkin Donuts guy! Remember him? Talk about a memorable USP (unique selling proposition)!

“I made the donuts!”

Well, I was that guy. I was working 16 to 18 hours a day 6 days a week and then doing paperwork for several hours on Sunday…just to catch up. Only to begin again on Monday. What had once been my baby and the most important thing in my life had turned into something akin to the entrepreneurial version of the Bataan Death March, in both physical and psychological terms!

The havoc that schedule was wreaking on my health after three years was noticeable and the effect and impact on my mental outlook was nothing short of disastrous. I was beginning a new life, my son was still young, and I didn’t want the rest of my life to be an everyday death march, passing myself coming and going 365 days a year.

So I got out!

Not right away, mind you..but I knew something had to change. It took getting sick, mononucleosis as a matter of fact.  Mono seemed particularly appropriate for some reason because I owned a health club and trained athletes. But what mono really did for me was it allowed me to step away from the trees long enough to see the forest. Once I did, the decision was easy. I was killing myself bit by bit but was so invested in the “ownership” of the concept the business was built up0on I lost sight of the fact that the business no longer looked anything like the one I started 4 years earlier.

And, I had indeed become The Dunkin Donuts Guy!

The decision was made easier when a friend, Dave M, walked into my office and put his paycheck on the table. He knew I was one of those people you call a “born salesman,” even though I hate conventional sales tactics, and particularly script selling. Dave also knew I was thinking about moving on to a new venture….but what?

Well, Dave looked me in the eye and asked me how long I was going to continue to kill myself when he knew for a fact that I could make at least as much as he had put in front of me, week in and week out and not work half as hard. The paycheck, for a 4 and 1/2 day workweek was in the mid-4 figures.

Now, when I started my business we were bringing in between $20,000 and $30,000 a month, during the late 70s and early 80s recession, but that was channeled right back into the business and I rarely took a dime. As time went on, although the business was doing well, I never bothered to take a paycheck because the business was mine, until I started taking on partners (big mistake and the topic for another post), and I really didn’t need the money.

Nice, huh?

But I was intrigued with Dave’s offer!

I said I would think about it, talked to Connie about the traveling involved in a advertising and marketing gig and the stress of a marketing job like that, and decided to go ahead with it.

That 6 figure position came complete with a road map to the good life. I had a new direction to my life, a direction based on a decision made at a time when I wasn’t really thinking clearly. But the decision seemed to be a good one. I was on my way, set new goals, and even said “I do!”

New job, new life, new wife, new home in my home town of Bay Village…what more could one ask for?

My attorney notified me after two months with the firm that I was officially making enough money to put me in the top 5% of all wage earners in the country!

All seemed right with the world!

“Then Depression Set In! Bill Murray in Stripes

I’ll never forget that line!

Unfortunately, I hadn’t taken into account how taxing the travel would be, 3 weeks out of every month on the road, home for the weekend only to go back on the road Sunday night or early Monday morning. Yes, Connie traveled with me from time to time but it was distracting and I felt guilty leaving her for extended periods at the hotel. Here we were, newlyweds and I was leaving 3 of every 4 weeks in the month. And I wasn’t traveling to postcard destinations!

I was going to Buffalo, Detroit, Cincinnati, Columbus, Pittsburgh, and, heaven help me, Ashtabula and Chillicothe, Ohio. Yes, the money was super and we were put up in Las Vegas on the company for as few days and I was routinely in the top 5 in the country…but the traveling was a downer.

I also hadn’t realized how much I would hate the prospecting part of the business, it had been presented quite differently! I was often making cold calls for 3-5 hours a day, Tuesday through Thursday, in order to set up my afternoon sales appointments and presentations. I got to the point where I could not pick up the telephone without getting physically ill and would be in a bad mood all day Sunday, knowing I had to go back on the road Sunday night or Monday.

Talk about hating the phone and cold calling! Something I still haven’t overcome!

I was the Dunkin Donuts guy again!

I finally came to the realization, just as I had with my own business, that regardless of the money and the commitment, I had to quit!

This was way before Seth Godin’s popularity but we would have been on the same page:

This wasn’t a Dip, this was a cliff! And, there was nothing else to do but QUIT!

The stress of being in a Type A environment and being a Type A personality, I was doomed to repeat this sort of scenario over and over again. I was selling myself to the highest bidder for a paycheck.

I needed something else…something more…or the cycle would repeat itself over and over again for the rest of my life!

The cost of pursuing that lifestyle came at a such a high price to myself and family, both in terms of time away from the family but also in terms of the high stress carryover into our family’s day-to-day affairs, it just wasn’t worth it.

Our loved ones suffer, often silently, as they watch us burn the candle at both ends, as well as in the middle, just to provide more material “things.”

Something had to change!

You know, most families would rather have us home and happy versus killing ourselves for a few bucks more in a paycheck…and a house with too many bedrooms.

Time, Proximity, and Do-Overs

Sadly, time and proximity are tough to buck!

Unless you buy into the whole Back to the Future thing and have access to a Flux Capacitor and an old DeLorean, hindsight is pretty much going to remain hindsight.

I have talked about do-overs here before and I was granted a do-over. New family, new educational opportunities, a new lease on life, literally. I got my do-over and so far have not squandered it…so far. Funny thing about time, it does things to you memory and may even alter perspective, it is a trap.

The old saying:

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it!

I will not forget the lessons of my past. The things I thought were so crucial? The goals and the things I believed important? The things that would define my success and provide the lifestyle I had envisioned for my family?

I was wrong!

I hope you are able to benefit from my hindsight. “Choose wisely Grasshopper!” Many of the goals we set for ourselves are based on what someone else pushed into our heads from early on in our lives and the things we think precious? They are right in front of you when you sit at the dinner table. They are next to you when you say good night. They are on the other end of the telephone saying “I love you Dad!” when they are away from home.

The most important things in life, the life lessons?

It’s the intangibles!

The rest is scrap! The rest is replaceable, breaks, rusts, burns down, gets stolen, is devalued or is otherwise impermanent.

We come into this world naked and we are going out the same way. The only thing permanent you will have with you as you face your maker, and Sam Walton found this out too late (I wonder how much he would have paid for a do-over? My bet? Anything! )  is the love of those you have touched…that is your immortality!

Your ultimate success will be defined in terms of how others remember you. Your ultimate success will be viewed in terms of the TIME you spent with those you love and who love you! Your success will be recognized in terms of the PROXIMITY you allowed others to have to you!

Time and Proximity

Unfortunately, as most of your moms have probably said about you, and mine said about me, we seem to have to learn things for ourselves…the hard way! I hope not!

Do you want to be able to say:

I got it right…I nailed it! My life had value and meaning!

Or will you say what so many others have said before you:

I blew it!

Thanks for taking the time to get through this. I know it took some time and I hope you feel it was well invested. If so, please pass this along, comment, provide feedback…including your own anecdotes!

Thanks!

John Zajaros
The Ultimate Internet Image
Lakewood, Ohio 44107
216-712-7004 (office)
440-821-7018 (cell)
Skype: johnzajaros1
excellencepaidforward@gmail.com (personal email address)

PS, Join me on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn!

Celebrating Life: Faith, Hope, Desire, Unconditional Love, and a Little Luck!

What can I say about this weekend? It was one of the best, if not the best, of my life…and that’s saying a lot!

Connie and I are celebrating of 26th year as husband and wife today and this past weekend was a nonstop celebration.

A little over a year ago I was still a regular visitor at the local hospital and frankly wasn’t making plans into the future. I was so sick I was literally in the hospital 2 of every 4 weeks from December of 2004 through April of 2008…and then on and off until last year.

Now?

The future is wide open and the possibilities are infinite!

Last night I got to spend the evening with my precious little granddaughter Kailyn. Kailyn and I have a special bond and the love is unconditional. I wasn’t sure if I could love another human being as much as I love my wife and daughters but Kailyn has laid that fear to rest…she is the embodiment of unconditional love!

Brynnie is amazing, so cute. But Brynnie as also afraid of the loud noises, so we had a problem. Connie put her own feelings and desires aside, as always, and offered to stay behind and watch Brynn while I spent “Grandpa Time” with Kailyn.

It was one of the best experiences I’ve had in a long time!

I am sharing this with you for one reason:

To give you hope!

If you are in a rough patch? If you are struggling? If life isn’t exactly what you’d hoped it would be?

There is a light at the end of the tunnel!

You are only constrained by your hope, faith, desire, and imagination. If there is an ounce of fight left in you?

Fight!

Life is worth it!

This is just a glimpse into what is waiting for you at the end of the tunnel if you don’t quit, if you continue to press on, and if you have faith in yourself and in people…because people are amazing!

The funny thing about people is while we’ve been taught to be somewhat skeptical, and even a bit cynical at times, we all want to believe…believe in what is good, honest, and true.

I have to tell you: People are good! People want to help! People want to share! And people will open themselves up to you if you show genuine empathy, compassion, and honesty! That’s why social media is such a hit! It has nothing to do with the Internet and everything to do with our thirst for something real, something or someone we can connect with and believe in!

That certain something is out there, it is available to you…providing you are willing to open up, be yourself, and have faith in your fellow man or woman.

People are amazing…and so is life! If you give both a chance, immersing yourself in life while allowing people in, you will never be sorry, at least not in the ways that really matter.

Well, enough for today. I few too many exclamation points, perhaps? But that’s the kind of high I an riding…a good high…a natural high…the kind of high that comes from:

Celebrating Life: Faith, Hope, Desire, Unconditional Love, and a Little Luck!

Take care and, as always, contact me anytime if you need to!

John Zajaros (and Kailyn)
440-821-7018 (cell)
excellencepaidforward@gmail.com (personal email address)
The Ultimate Internet Image
Lakewood, Ohio

PS, I hope you enjoy the video!

Life Lessons: Word of Mouth Advertising Going Strong After 4 Decades
The Lesson of Jack Palmer and Chuck Christian

My little dog, TuffGuy, and I were out for our usual midnight walk last night. We started last summer, a way to get back into shape, lose some weight (both of us), and overcome the chronic back pain and sciatica I had endured for many years. TuffGuy and I walked last year until the snow fell; it was a very enjoyable routine. We stopped, mainly because the salt and ice hurt his paws. TuffGuy would have continued, just as dogs will walk with their masters in the hot summer sun until they fall over dead of heat exhaustion, too loyal and too happy for the time together to quit. I have always thought of that as the most powerful example of unconditional love I have every heard of. For that reason I am well aware of how far dogs will push themselves beyond the pain barrier, just to be with their masters, so I am very careful with ours.

We also stopped because people don’t shovel their sidewalks anymore. In fact, I believe the failure to shovel your sidewalk, while seemingly very insignificant, is really a symptom of the fact that neighbors and neighborhoods aren’t connected. In fact, we aren’t even neighbors and there aren’t neighborhoods any more, just people living next door or in the area. Yes, there are exceptions but for the most part, the “village” is long gone. Perhaps everyone is inside tweeting? For whatever the reason, “neighbors” have, as a general rule, ceased to care about the residents on either side of them.

So, why bother!

Anyway, when I lost my walking buddy, my accountability partner, as I call him, it just wasn’t as much fun. When the fun went out of it, I just stopped, not willing to risk the sidewalks and the ice…not after 15 major surgeries on my neck, back, and shoulder.

No way!

So, when the weather started to get nice again, I got the itch. I also felt the waistline on my pants a bit more than I wanted to. Then, my daughter said TuffGuy was starting to look like a sausage!

Well, offend me but never my dog!

Consequently, TuffGuy and I were right back at it, saying hello to all the doormen in front of the bars along Detroit Ave; and, all as if we hadn’t missed a beat. I am always greeted with a friendly smile and a kind word but it is TuffGuy that gets the bulk of the attention:

“Hey! TuffffGuuuyyy!”

Is the standard greeting from the doormen.

“Awwww isn’t he cute!”

Comes from the pretty girls.

He, of course, wants nothing to do with them but they all want to pet him.

Now, if I were a 20 something single guy…..

Need I say more?

TuffGuy is what we used to so inappropriately call a “chick magnet” back in the day. In fact, he works better than any Corvette I have ever owned or been seen in! Often on Detroit Ave when I was growing up.

Life Lesson: If you’re a single guy and want to meet pretty girls?

Get a cute little dog and go for walks on any street in America like Detroit Ave. Detroit Avenue is safe, has lots of bars and pizza joints, and lots of pretty girls! Oh to be 20 something again.

Not on your life!

So, 500 words later I get to the main Life Lesson? Not quite but almost. Better late then never, as my mom would always say when I walked in late for dinner:

“John Patrick!”

Or, if I was really in the dog house:

“John Patrick Jude Zajaros!!”

Then I knew it was all over for the evening…or the week.

Grounded!

So anyway, I was walking with TuffGuy and I started to catch up with this older gentleman and his rather huge dog. The older gentleman was not small either. In fact, he was about 6’4” and probably weighed in at about 225lbs. Not a small guy!

Big, bald, and he seemed to be slowing down?

I started to slow down too! I walk for solitude and to listen to my audiobooks. I didn’t want to get stuck, I wanted to go about my routine. Besides, you never know with people and especially people with dogs, big dogs. I have run into all kinds on our walks; and, so has TuffGuy.

Additionally, dogs can be funny, you just never know how they’re going to react with other dogs or with strange people. Dogs are kind of like people in that way, I suppose, situationally unpredictable. You see, I know this from watching TuffGuy. We have plenty of experience with all the people who want to pet him on our walks and they just assume he will let them. Well, he doesn’t go for it at all; and is, in fact, very stand-offish.

But when it comes to other dogs? TuffGuy doesn’t know he’s ¾ Pug and ¼ Beagle, he thinks because he looks like a miniature Bull Mastiff he is one! Consequently, TuffGuy sees another dog, he wants to do the dog thing and check him or her out…preferably her!

Life Lesson: A male is a male is a male!

Well, TuffGuy and this man seemed to be thinking the same thing, bent on meeting, so I relented and we caught up.

The dogs did their doggy thing, sniffed, wagged their tails, and generally had a good old time. It was fun to watch them make nice for a while. The Big Guy and I started to talk and walk and do the guy thing, sans the waging of the tails!

Everything seemed to be OK!

Turns out the Big Guy’s name was Chuck Christian and he usually walks his dog earlier in the evening. I walked TuffGuy a bit earlier than usual, it was such a nice night and I wanted to get out. Because Chuck was walking Beast a bit later than usual, we ran into each other.

And no, his dog’s name isn’t Beast, I just never got his name and it seemed to fit the story and the Big Guy. I’ll get it next time…promise!

So, Beast it is!

Anyway, Chuck told me he lived down the street, had for 40 years. Seems he bought his house from a guy by the name of Jack Palmer.

“Do you know Jack?” he asked me.

“Well,” he went on, “Jack Palmer is the most honest man in Lakewood. That house was in need of a lot when we moved in, bunch a bikers had lived there and the lady who owned it wanted them out. I had a friend and he told me to see Jack Palmer and no one else, that Jack Palmer is the most honest guy I’d ever meet. And he was right! Jack Palmer is the most honest man I have ever dealt with!”

Chuck Christian went on to tell me a bit more about himself and the house, where his son lived, and some additional things about his life, but he kept coming back to “Jack Palmer, the most honest man, a great man!”

It seems that Chuck had also seen TuffGuy and I before, at the metro parks dog park, so we talked about that for a while, and walked.

Back to the Life Lesson

Now, the fact that Chuck Christian knew Jack Palmer as “the most honest man he had ever dealt with” wasn’t what intrigued me most, although it was certainly enough to consider calling Jack if I was ever in need of another property, it was how long it had been since Chuck had purchased the house from Jack and how many people Chuck has told that story to over the past 40 years!

Imagine that for a moment!

One man, happily talking about a great and “honest” guy by the name of Jack Palmer for 40 years. Get that? Chuck is still talking about his “friend” 40 years after he has done business with him.

If ever there was an example of Girard’s Law of 250 I was witnessing it firsthand!

You see, according to Girard’s Law of 250, everyone has in his or her sphere of influence 250 people. Everyone has 250 people they know well enough and have enough influence over that they will show up at their wake or funeral when they pass away. It is anecdotal but it makes sense. Funeral directors, as a rule, order 250 cards for the passing of most people because they have discovered over the years that 250 people will pay their last respects.

The beginnings of the Law of 250!

Interestingly, Joe Girard heard this and took it another step. If you alienate one person a day and that person has a sphere of influence of 250 people…

…and so on…and so….and so on…

In a year you would have enough people to fill the Giant’s Stadium or Yankee Stadium, all screaming “Don’t buy from “(insert name here)!”

Powerful marketing lesson!

Significantly, let’s look at the reverse scenario:

Chuck Christian has been telling people about his “honest” friend Jack Palmer for 40 years! Not just his immediate sphere of influence, they have probably heard it until they, Chuck, and everyone else are blue in the face. It’s the other people he tells, complete strangers on his walk with Beast every day, that’s the kicker!

That is not only a marketing lesson, that is a…Yup!

Life Lesson!

If he just tells one person each and every day for 365 days over for 40 years? That’s 14,600 people who have all heard that Jack Palmer is the most honest guy in the world to deal with, in any profession.

Let’s apply Girard’s Law to that and say that each of those people knows 250 people and not do the whole Breck thing or we will be at it all night.

3,650,000 people!

That’s a LIFE LESSON!

If he gets a .01% response from the Law of 250 he sells 365 homes over his lifetime thanks to one man…Chuck Christian!

That’s 3,650,000 x .0001

Interestingly, and this is the 40 million dollar question:

How many Chuck Christians do you know and do business with day in and day out? And, more significantly, which side of the equation are you on?

There are only two:

1) That SOB or the Bleeping Company, I’ll never buy anything else from him (them) as long as I live, he (they) is (are) the most dishonest (disreputable) guy (company) on the planet!

2) Or, That (insert name here), he (or she or they) is (are) the most honest man (or woman or company) on (insert city, town, or village) planet!

Ultimately, it is a choice, which side of the equation you and/or your company will be on in this.

But one thing is absolutely certain, the ultimate Life Lesson:

This world is shrinking and with it the room to run, to start over, or to repair or rebuild a soiled reputation.

The Law of 250 and The Jack Palmer Lesson are one in the same and, if you don’t think so, you have a rude awakening around the bend because the world is a very small place, for anyone or any company!

John Zajaros
216-712-7004
johnz@johnzajaros.com

PS, I will share some horror stories that I have had and others that have been shared with me, not to soil anyone’s reputation but to forewarn those who are not the most honest, the most reputable, before they fall victim to individuals or companies who feel there is an unending supply of clients and all they have to do is run more, bigger, and louder ads. Not any more!

PPS, If you doubt the power of one person to make a difference? Google “Dell Hell” and you will get 164,000 resulting web pages and it all started with one angry individual who couldn’t get his laptop serviced and was “mad has hell and not going to take it any more!” Or just check out Randy Cassingham’s awesome blog “This is True!” It will wake you up to what one person with a voice can do…and anyone can develop a voice online!

Where Do We Fail? The Death of Dreams

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about how we end up, where we end up. It may be a consequence of my getting older, notice I didn’t say “old,” but I believe there is more to life. How do we define success and what defines a failure?

Perhaps it has grown out of my own life experiences, combined with my experiences, hopes, desires, and even frustrations as a parent. I don’t know, perhaps it is just one of those things we begin to think about as we age? But for whatever reason, I think it is a subject worth writing about…so here goes!

Question:

Have you ever wondered what happened to the little boy or girl you used to be? You know the one I am talking about, don’t you?

The dreamer, the little kid who wanted to be a fireman or a doctor or an astronaut or even the President of the United States! We have all been there, or almost all of us…haven’t we?

Yes, some of us are those things but, unfortunately, most of us have settled for less, much less than we once dreamed of becoming. At some point on our journey through life, we threw in the towel!

So, what happened to that person?

I know, I know!

We grew up, right? Life intrudes. We got older and more responsible.

Wrong, that’s a cop out!

Or, more plainly…horse manure!

The fact is, we get beat up…at least the majority of us anyway. Now, I’m not talking about a physical beating, although that is certainly part of it for some, unfortunately, I am talking about the way the system (i.e., schools, friends, and even well-meaning family members) systematically teach us to be “realistic” and “practical” over a lifetime until we finally settle for less than we had once envisioned.

The dreams of our childhood become the flights of fancy, youthful exuberance, not to be taken seriously. We are taught to fit in, to be good team members, to tow the line. Our creativity and imagination are sytematically attacked and ultimately dismantled, until the dreams and visions of childhood are a fleeting memory.

Sad but true!

How many grow up saying:

“I want to be a middle manager at a downtown warehouse!”

Or:

“I really want to be a short-order cook for the greasy spoon down by the highway!”

Right, me too!

NOT!

Now, imagine being in your 40s or 50s and looking back, wondering what happened. Interestingly, while many of us have had these moments, not many talk about them. Heck, no one will even admit to having these thoughts!

Why?

Because to do so is an admission, we are saying that somewhere along the line something went wrong, terribly wrong, we settled, we allowed others to derail our grand designs for an exciting life…we allowed life to define us instead defining our lives!

So, you are 40 or 60 or 70 and you look back at your life and you don’t like what you see.

Welcome to the club!

Are you too late? Is it too late?

Many would believe it is, many would have you believe it is, and many would tell you it is. Significantly, those closest to you will argue it is; and, that you need to be “practical” and “realistic!”

Remember those well-meaning friends and relatives?

Yup!

They are also the same ones who have shot down every new idea you have had over the span of a lifetime.

Why?

Not for you!

For them!

Because, after all, what if you do succeed? What if you do something amazing? What will that say about them and their lives?

Do not kid yourself, most people at a very primitive level, do not want you to succeed because that would make them feel bad!

Interestingly, it is not too late, that there is plenty of time. You can, and should, step back and reassess the tragectory of you life, beginning anew. To do otherwise is a waste of life!

Let me ask you this?

Let’s say you are 40 years old. And, let’s say you are miserable, that you dread waking up in the morning and facing another day of your life as it is, that you can’t understand where you went wrong but you are ceratin of one thing…it is all wrong!

If you do nothing, how old will you be in 20 years? 30 years?

Yup!

You will be 60 or 70 years old!

Right?

Now, you have a choice, you can be 60 or 70 years of age and have enjoyed the past 20 or 30 years, doing what you want, what excites you, and what makes you happy. Or, you can be 60 or 70 years of age and have lived, if you actually survive another two or three decades doing something you dread each and every day, facing even more of what you have dreaded for decades, the life you despise.

What life-trajectory would you choose?

Now, let’s say you are 30 or 40?

You have at the very least 4 decades of your life ahead of you!

Do you wake up every day glad to be alive? Are you doing something that excites and fulfills you?

If not, bail!

Do it yesterday!

I know, I know!

Here’s the party-line, what the majority will think and respond with:

“But I have a family, I have obligations, I can’t just walk away from my responsibilities!”

Poppycock!

Your family will be there for you, if they truly love you and want the best for you, they will support you. If your family is so caught up in their life own lives that they cannot see you are suffering, that you are in terrible pain (the cave you are in), then it is time to look hard at your relationship.

Do you honestly believe anyone who truly loves you will have you live another 30 or 40 years doing something you detest each and every day?

That, in and of itself, is a death sentence!

Somewhere along the line, some of us, many of us, have allowed someone, or more likely a series of someones, to derail our hopes and dreams for an amazing life. We went along with what they were selling and, when we woke up half of our life was gone.

I am telling you today you can still have it, you can have it all! It is not too late!

We have all heard the Colonel Saunders story. Broke and on Social Security he carved out a new life selling his chicken recipe.

Limiting beliefs?

You can do it again and you can do it all over, beginning today!

Just like when we were kids, you get a do-over each and every day. It is up to you how you use it. You can never go back but the wealth of knowledge you have collected over a lifetime makes you a better person, more likely to succeed at whatever it is you want to accomplish.

Again, it is up to you.

I call do-over!

From this moment forward you can cave in and forever resign yourself to an existence as a resident of Plato’s cave…or you can step out into the light of life and do something amazing. True, you might not qualify for astronaurt training but I understand Richard Branson is taking reservations for Virgin Galactic!

Do-over!

Call it out…begin anew…begin today!

Contact me anytime!

John Zajaros

216-712-6526 (home)
440-821-7018 (cell)
excellencepaidforward@gmail.com (personal email)

PS, If you have children, guard their dreams carefully and nurture their imagination and their creativity. The people who can truly think creatively and imaginatively will be in demand throughout their lives. Heck, they are already! Seth Godin calls them Linchpins, I call them indispensable!

The Groundhog Day Lesson: A Lesson for Business Success…Life Success!

I love the movie Groundhog Day with Bill Murray! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watched it over the years. Bill Murray is something of an enigma, sometimes absolutely brilliant and other times he is just plain awful…or the parts he plays are anyway. Perhaps he tries to stretch himself, do the unconventional, accept the risky, non traditional roles in order to pursue his craft, his art. For whatever reason, he can absolutely leave me in stitches or make me want to bolt for the door.

However, because he has the ability to captivate and entertain, I take a chance with his movies time and again. Groundhog Day and What About Bob? are two of his bests!

Another Murray role, The Razor’s Edge, is a bit gritty but tells a tale, a 1984 Hollywood remake of a 1946 Tyrone Power film of the 1944 bestseller by W. Somerset Maugham, of a disenchanted and disillusioned WWI veteran seeking to find himself in India after The Great War. Murray pulls off the part of Larry Darrell in a way that touches the heart and reminds us that Vietnam veterans were not the only ones affected by what is now called PTSD, that there was in fact an entire generation that was lost: The Lost Generation.

Indeed, nothing is new!

What does any of this have to do with the title of this article? What does Bill Murray’s selection of movie roles, and in particular his performance in the movie Groundhog Day, have to do with marketing and brick and mortar business success?

It’s really pretty obvious if you stop and think about it; and, if you have seen the movie. The movie is about living the same day over and over again until you get it right. But more that that, it is about mindset and the realization that each day can be a learning experience, one that will ultimately get you to your goal…regardless of how elusive that goal may initially seem to be.

The magic of the story is in the progression of Bill Murray‘s character, Phil Connors, a Pittsburg weatherman trapped day after day in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. At first, Connors (Murray) does the same thing over and over again, doomed to repeat the same mundane exercises day in and day out, always on Groundhog Day.

Phil, yes, the same name as the Groundhog, eventually tires of the experience and attempts to put an end to the torture by, among other things, driving off a cliff, along with Punxsutawney Phil himself (the groundhog) seated at the steering wheel with him. And yes, only to awaken again the next morning to the same some on the clock radio, the same music blaring I Got You Babe by Sonny and Cher, and the same cornball radio announcer reading the same corny script!

Same radio announcer, same morning routine, same Phil. Day in, day out, misery every step of the way!

After days of repetition, boredom, and failing in every attempt to end it all, realizing that he was never going to escape, a light bulb goes off and Phil Connors hatches a plan.

In Hollywood it’s always about “the girl!” But in life it could be anything…but it is still, usually, about “the girl!”

So, falling for his producer, the beautiful Rita played by the indeed stunning Andie MacDowell, Murray has incentive to change, to rethink his life and, in setting his sights on Rita, Connors has a goal, a reason to live…and to learn!

This is a key component of the story line, and this is Hollywood, so everything revolves around this infatuation, an infatuation that ultimately leads to much more.

But you have to see the movie for that!

Anyway, Connors sees an opening and begins to treat every new day as a learning experience, a learning experience that will ultimately lead to a relationship with the object of his desire, Rita!

Instead of simply going through each and every day as he had the one before, dreading the routine he had been sentenced to, Murray’s character begins to study, learn, and finally…grow!

OK! I have said enough about Groundhog Day. But I hope you can see where I am going with this?

As business owners this lesson is particularly applicable. For that matter, the lesson applies to anyone who wakes up day after day to the same old, same old. You see, we go through the same routine, we apply the same strategies, and we hope for the same outcome, day in and day out.

Every day the alarm clock goes off at the same time, we get up to the same radio station, we drink the same coffee, we run the same distance or do the same workout (maybe!), drive the same car, open the same door to the same business at the same time, and we apply the same strategies to our running of the business in the same way with the same effect…day in and day out!

…because it is what we know…because it is safe!

Not only is this tragic, it is a waste of life!

It is a death sentence!

Personally, spiritually, financially, and emotionally…you are walking around day after day and it is always….

GROUNDHOG’S DAY!

It doesn’t have to be that way!

In the movie, Phil Connors discovers, after being repeatedly brutalized by the mundane, stagnant life he has come to accept as his ultimate reality, that each day is another opportunity to do it better, to get it right, and to grow in the process.

Triumph!

Phil Connors begins to live each day, building upon the one before, a progression towards a goal. Yes, Rita in the movie…
…but we all have our own “Rita,” don’t we?

How sad it is, how unfortunate that, as stated above, most of us get up in the morning, go through our morning rituals, get to work, go through another set of rituals, and before we know it is time to go home, another ritual.

We get home, go through another set of routines, part of which is usually telling whoever asks that nothing much happened, just another day at the office, and then we retire, another ritual….only to do it again…tomorrow…

Groundhog Day!

Over and over again! Nothing new, nothing learned, just repetition and a sick feeling that our lives are not our own, that they are certainly not what we had envisioned so very long ago.

We do the same things hoping that it will be enough and by the time the light bulb does go off…it is often too late! No time for a do-over, no time for anything new because we didn’t snap out of it in time.

Twilight Zone?

“Picture this, a life, a business, a person going nowhere. See the man on an endless treadmill, one he does not see, cannot see, will not see…until it is too late.

“And then?

“Well, then it is over…until tomorrow…when he will once again mount the treadmill and once again……Groundhog Day……”

It is NOT too late! There is indeed time!

We all get do-overs throughout our lives…we just have to be smart enough to recognize them as opportunities for growth, opportunities to learn, to something greater than our present selves!

Life is not a death sentence, the same old, same old!

Groundhog Day can mean the beginning of a new day, a day to learn, to grow, to become something more!

It is up to you!

John

Family, Tutoring Kids, and Consulting Businesses: Empathy and Life

This has been a week for life lessons, particularly lessons in empathy. Over the past week I have been reminded of the power of putting myself in another’s shoes, walking a mile in them, over and again; and, I am better for the experience.

Last week was a full one, as most weeks are now that I am rebuilding my life. Fighting illness for over a decade, an illness I once believed would take my life, I have little time for idleness and spend every waking hour teaching, coaching, mentoring, and consulting. In my spare time, I spend all my time with my family.

I love the time I am able to share with my granddaughters Kailyn and Brynn…the lights of my life! To think I almost lost that? I am so grateful just to be here!

Back to Empathy

In the last week I have been reminded over and over again that in order to be successful in life one must understand and practice empathy.

I have watched my kids struggle, learning the life lessons I can’t teach them, the ones they must learn for themselves. I have been challenged in ways only a parent and grandparent who loves his family more than life itself can be, having to step back and let life take its course…regardless of the pain it must cause.

I know what my kids must be feeling; and yet, I cannot and must not interfere if they are to grow into strong and self reliant adults. Empathy is a double-edged sword and at times it cuts deep.

Empathy!

On Friday night I sat with a mother and father, parents obviously in pain, two people trying to understand and deal with their son’s ADHD. To their credit, while divorced they sat at the kitchen table next to each other to discuss their son’s needs.

In order to come to grips with what their son is experiencing they put their personal differences aside, they acted in a loving and selfless manner in order to help their child. It was obvious these wonderful people felt sympathy, compassion, concern, and, above all, unconditional love.

I felt empathy!

As I sat there, discussing the issues their son was, is, and will be facing over the next few years, I watched as the young boy’s mother held back the tears. I was moved, holding back my own tears, knowing what she was experiencing first hand. You see, I was that parent 28 years ago, sitting with an expert, seeking answers for my child. The empathy I saw in that young counselor’s eyes almost three decades ago is undoubtedly the same sort empathy, and sympathy, that little boy’s mother and father saw in my eyes, heard in my voice, as I tried to consult, console, and encourage.

Empathy!

As a marketing consultant specializing in inbound marketing and working with small and medium sized businesses, I have had occasion to consult with quite a few businessmen and women over the past few weeks and months. Sadly, I see concern, worry, dismay, and even fatigue in their eyes and on their faces. As we speak, I hear the concern and the weariness in their voices as they speak of the current economy and their concerns for their businesses, their employees, their families, and their futures.

I know what they are feeling on so many different levels, I feel their pain and I know the concern they feel for those they feel responsible for.

Empathy!

When I take on a client I interview them, more-so than they-me. I am attempting to get to know them, understand them, empathize with them.

When I consult with parents and business owners alike, I do all I can to understand what concerns and motivates them. You see, if I can empathize with them and with their situation, if I can understand and even relate to what they are experiencing on a personal level, I can serve them. If we are a good match, and I understand who they are and why they are seeking my help, I can go the extra mile when necessary. When required, I can take on some of their pain and help them through the most difficult patches.

If I can’t empathize with them, if I can’t relate to them and/or their concerns, I can’t serve them; and, they are better off with someone else.

Empathy!

Empathy allows us to identify with friends, family, business associates, and even complete strangers. Empathy allows us to connect with one another in a way that makes the bond a little tighter, a little more special, and a lot easier to maintain during the tests every relationship experiences, personal or business.

I have been asked if my life would be easier, less stressful, if I didn’t “feel” so much!

My answer is always the same:

We all yearn for connection, we seek meaningful relationships, we are all social beings!

Social media has certainly validated this. I have been saying this for years…we need each other to be completely human.

Empathy is a crucial ingredient, without empathy we fail to connect, we are something less than what we can be, must be!

Empathy, along with passion, compassion, and love make us better, allow us to serve our fellow man in a manner that would be impossible without it.

Empathy!

Contact me any time!

John
440-821-7018 (cell)
excellencepaidforward@gmail.com (personal email)

Daughters and Granddaughters: God's Gift to Fathers and Grandfathers!

In Your Eyes! Unconditional Love and Grandchildren

The greatest heartbreak in life is watching your children and grandchildren struggle, regardless of their age! We still see them as little boys full of dreams and wonder and little girls with ponytails flying behind them as the chase puppies, butterflies, and later soccer balls and boys!

“Ugh, boys!”

I remember that one…they all said it!

Our children give so much, more than we ever give them. Their love is unconditional, which makes stepping back and allowing them to grow on their own all the more difficult!

We want to shelter them, protect them, and love them.

Unfortunately, in protecting them we may not be helping them.

As parents and even as grandparents we are torn. Love sometimes means pushing them out of the nest. Other times it means allowing them to fall towards the earth until they learn to flap their wings…all the time dreading the thought that perhaps they won’t flap hard enough or in time!

Life, parenting, and even grandparenting can be very difficult…and quite wonderful!

Life is amazing!

John