Moments of Learning, Lifetime of Wisdom

Aesop101

Now that I'm a bit older <G> I think back to those precious moments when some one makes a quip that sticks with you over your life.

I had an interview this morning that brought back several of those rare bits of wisdom that I received over my life. Things that I never really understood the value of at the time they were said. Truly wish I could thank those people. Unfortunately I don't know where they are and some have passed.

Once near the end of the day one of my co-workers was slacking near the end of the day. The supervisor said, "Hey, you get paid for those last 5 minutes just like you do from the first 5. I didn't let that pass without notice. At one job I had I recalled that remark and started checking my productivity on a daily level. As it turned out I was most productive on Tuesday through Thursday. No surprise there. So I started reflecting how I was thinking about Mondays and Fridays. As it turns out it was my thinking that was off. So I made an effort to get more done on Friday and Monday. One thing I did was to start planning my week. Then I made efforts to not be distracted from my tasks. Mostly that was internal distraction. In the end my Fridays and Mondays turned out to be just as productive as the rest of the week.

Another time I was working in Sanitation doing some mopping. A co-worker told me I didn't know how to mop. I laughed! Okay show me in my arrogant 19 year old way. He takes the mop and does more in 5 minutes than I did in an hour. He laughs and hands me back the mop. From that point I realized you learn from everyone and started listening.

At age 9 I read a comic strip strip about a kids who woke up late for school. He throws on his clothes, dashes out the door, and then pushes his bike all the way to school. A classmate sees him pushing his bike up to the rack and asks why wasn't riding it. His reply, "I didn't have time to get on it!" That one came back to bite me about a month ago. I was building a spreadsheet and double entering data on 2 different worksheets. I thought doh! I seemed to busy to just link the data but yet the time savings would be enormous.

One even came from me, well sort of. When I started college one of the professors said in order to be successful in college you have to learn to strive. I took that to hear and really reflected on it for some time. Now I've always been physically active in some sport or another so I understood striving. Then when I had kids I always told them if you learn to strive physically you can learn to strive mentally and vice versa. So when I was wrapping my last CPA exam in October I started thinking if I put this much effort into losing weight I should be successful. As it turns out so far I am. I often share that with potential employers.

There's been many other occasions but these were so relevant today in that interview. Funny how that works.