Underachievers Club
“I am honored to Stand before you tonight and accept this Lifetime Achievement Award…”
Some guys have all the luck – and I am fortunate enough to say that I am one of those fortunate Individuals. Having enjoyed a career that has taken me to virtually every corner of the planet (yeah, I know objects that are round don’t have corners – but work with me), I have been blessed with more than my fair share of success.
Having been selected for a Life Time Achievement award by the Perpetually Under Achieving Club, I was to be Honored and given the opportunity to share a few thoughts of Wisdom to an assembled crowd. As I began to focus on the day and what I could possibly say to such an illustrious group, I noticed the mounting angst and stress that began to wash over me. With the date locked, the invitations sent and time drawing near, the pressure mounted as to the pearls of wisdom that I would share that would illustrate upon my unending ability to sneak under the professional bar of life. The more I pressed, the more the mental canvass went blank.
Holy Writers Block Batman!
Finally, it was time to catch a plane to what I was certain would be one of the most underwhelming moments ever. I would climb the dais, stand before the crowd and be forced to confess “I got nothing people…” Nice.
The flight uneventful, the cab ride through the Park brought me ever closer to my Greatest Under Achievement Ever. As I looked out the window at the children at play, I found the story – I found the answer. Wisdom had found me on 52nd Street!
The night progressed, kind words said by many (ok – a few people that I most likely owed money to). As the Honored Guest it soon was my turn. Taking the podium and adjusting the microphone, I proudly announced that everything I had ever achieved professionally could be summed up in one simple sentence, one simple philosophy.
Careers are Like a Hula Hoop.
With the audience stunned and thinking I needed another dose of medicine, I quickly explained what a wonderful group of unknown Schoolyard Children had shown me so elegantly that very day. During my intellectually vacant journey earlier that day, it struck me, that the key to success is what we learned via our favorite plastic playground toy from so long ago. To be successful we learn that we must:
- Enter the ring, taking our place with room to operate and grow
- Prepare ourselves with energy and focus
- Begin some unorthodox movement and exertion of energy
- Fail.
The Try Again – And Again – And Again.
We learn to keep trying until we have it right – and that magical moment of success encircles us and does so with enough momentum that it seems to take on a life of its own, building and speeding forward in ways previously unthought of. Careers and their associated Success requires effort, it requires Energy, but most importantly it requires Conviction. Obtaining Success and gaining achievement means trying, trying again, and trying one more time until your physical, mental and spiritual self ache. Yeah, kind of like being the 13th guy on a 12 man team. Having a Career and Life of Successful means exuding energy and making things happen. Over and over and over again.
Because when the energy stops, so does success.
With the night now complete, award in hand, the distant echo’s of applause still bouncing between my ears, I walked away feeling like the Greatest Philosopher since Forest Gump.
Careers are like Hula Hoops and we had come full circle.
Time to put some energy in to it.
Your Thoughts…
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