A Solid Piece of Advice

Advice comes from the strangest of places sometimes. There was one piece of advice that I received that stuck with me ever since since hearing it shook me right to the core. It was an absolute bit of truth of biblical proportions, and it came from the unlikeliest of sources.

Back in 2000, I was looking for a job. I answered lots of ads, and ended up in all kinds of weird places that I never went back to. One such place was a renovated QuikTrip near where my parents live, and while this place has had many names before and after this business was there, at the time I walked in through those doors, it was a place that sold vacuum cleaners. I did not know this when I responded to the ad, and like this type of job tends to do, they told me nothing about it over the phone.

I walked in and sat with a room of people curious about the job, and got pitched this job where you get paid for demonstrating a vacuum cleaner for people in their homes. They boasted screening and set appointments, and "all you have to do is" demo a certain number of times and you get paid regardless of whether one sells or not. If you get a sale, you get more. After watching the demo, I figured I had nothing better to do, so I thought I'd see how I did.

If you'd read this blog for any length of time, you can probably guess exactly how that went. Catastrophic failure would be a fairly accurate description. I made exactly bupkis doing this job. The X number of appointments never happened. Ever. In fact, the expectation turned out to be completely unrealistic, and it also turned out that no one ever achieved the sales necessary for the mega payout either. It was setup to look good, and pay as little as possible. Pretty much everyone quit very quickly.

While I was there, however, I was talking to the seedy head sales guy (who looked exactly like a seedy vacuum cleaner salesman), and he asked me about doing something. I can't remember what he asked, but I responded with the gainsay response that one gives when one forgets to do something. I told him that I didn't have time. That's when he said it. Pay attention to this one.

You make time for what's important to you.

When he said that, I just stopped and looked at him. It was as if the entire world of time and things to do just crashed down on top of me. It ripped time from an unreachable shelf and made it something that I controlled, but showed me that the 24 hours I get in a day are mine to do with as I please. There are obligations and options, but when it comes right down to it, I make that decision. This bit of advice ended up being coupled with another piece I got probably the year before or so from just as unlikely a source.

Before I was out of a job, I worked for that Fireplace Company where I lost my eye. At that company there was a guy who was older, but not entirely grizzled yet, who drove the forklift around the yard. again, I don't remember the circumstances of the discussion we were having, but he said I could leave and do something or another. Naturally, we were on the clock in the middle of the work day, so I said I couldn't leave. Then this exchange happened.

"You can do whatever you want," he said.

I paused for a moment, having never considered that very obvious notion, but then cleverly (I thought) responded, "Yeah, but there are consequences."

"Exactly," he said.

What does this add up to? A bit of wisdom that I'll impart to you, my lovely readers, on this Monday. Maybe you know this. Maybe you never thought about it. But within this is a bit of freedom you might not have noticed.

Your life is yours to live as you please. No one controls you. No one can tell you what to do with it. You have the freedom to choose where you spend your time, but of course, some things are more important than others, and you always have to weigh the consequences of doing versus not doing. You will always, however, make the time to do what you feel is important.

If family is important to you, you will find time to spend with them. If you love movies, you'll always be able to find a couple hours to watch one. If you love reading, you'll read. While choosing to do these things, you will choose not to do something else. You will have to live with those consequences. Some consequences are negligible, such as choosing a movie over a video game - your gamerscore might suffer. Some are more severe, such as choosing video games over the family - the relationship might suffer.

But in the end, the choice is yours. What is most important to you?