Nov 12
5
A Meaningful Life
A Meaningful Life
There I was, sitting at a restaurant in Chicago, surrounded by my friends and family. It was graduation night….supposed to be a mile-stone in my life. It was a mile-stone, but not at all as I had imagined it would be. Very unexpectedly, it became a PIVOTAL moment in my life that changed the way I thought forever.
I remember it like it was just yesterday, even though it was 1969. I was supposed to be happy, celebrating what I had been working for since kindergarten! My graduation from school….not just any high school. I opted to go to Jones Commercial in downtown Chicago because it was a Secretarial School that prepared you for the job. In fact, during the last year, half of the day was spent at school and the other half was spent at an actual job.
But instead of being elated and looking forward to my immediate future, it hit me like a ton of bricks:
I was just going from a 9-3 school schedule to a 9-5 work schedule!
Two more hours of my life were about to be given to someone else every day, five days a week! Did I go to school all those years just to prepare me for a 9-5 dead-end job just to pay bills?
A flood of questions came to my mind: Is this what life is all about – just survival? Get up in the morning, go to work, give your best, come home completely exhausted, have some dinner and go to bed only to have to get up and do it all over again the next day? Where is the joy of life, the satisfaction? Where is the passion and true accomplishment? Is this all there is? I could feel my mood drop into a state of depression. I had to figure this out.
At that precise moment in time – you could even freeze-frame it. . .it dawned on me that “There HAD to be more to life than working for a living!”
(Just a note here before we move on, because I can hear a few of you saying, yes, there’s much more to life. There is a spiritual side that you are missing. But that’s another subject. I am talking about the time involved that could be put to better use instead of building someone else’s business. Do we truly have to work on a Job 8 hours a day, 7 days a week 40+ hours a week, month after month, year after year – just to pay the bills? There has GOT to be a Better Way!!)
I struggled with the ideas as I asked myself again, “Is this what life is all about? Just work, sleep and wait for the week-ends……and not have enough time to start any projects or accomplish anything truly meaningful? Was I put on this earth to spend most of my time working to pay bills, just to survive?” No! This is unacceptable! It made absolutely no sense to me. From the inner recesses of my soul, from deep within, I knew there HAD to be more to life than this!
There had to be a BETTER way to live.
My mind was racing as I began to reason it out.
There’s not enough hours in the day to make enough exchanges for MONEY to earn more than the basic bills in life!!
If I was going to give 
my time to someone or something else, I’d better enjoy what I’m doing. Because Time IS your life ticking away. What you DO with your time – becomes your life! You make your life whatever you want it to be.
So whatever I choose to do has to fit my personality – I want to enjoy what I do and not just work to make green, it has to produce more money than just covering the basic bills to survive. It has to create an income that allows me to do what I WANT To accomplish, to make a difference, to live a life of PURPOSE. So I need to be crystal CLEAR on what I want in life.
The Motives Must Be PURE
Life is not JUST about making money to pay the bills.
It’s about having the money you need in order to accomplish your true aspirations in life.
It’s not about having a LOVE of money, based on greed.
It’s “Just MONEY,” a TOOL, so that you can live a Meaningful life!
These became core values of mine.
I also learned another from the great Zig Ziglar.
GIVING Before We RECEIVE is a lesson learned late in life by many! It is better to learn this early in life!
The more people you can touch, influence, persuade, HELP, the more satisfying your life will be. There is much to add to this discussion, but I’ll save it for another post so I can give it the full attention it deserves.
So, bottom line. . .
It is ultimately your decision – no one else can make it for you. No one can live your life for you. But, for me, at that very moment in time, sitting at that restaurant with my friends and family, thinking about how my life was about to take a change of direction and purpose – I was determined not to be like someone who lets life kick them around. I would not settle for less than what I wanted my life to be.
Yes, you might say I was somewhat rebellious (if judged by conventional standards), but it came from the purest motivation of valuing my time and what I did with it…valuing my life, wanting to live a life of purpose, with joy, accomplishment and deep satisfaction. What is wrong with that?
. . . And at that instant in time, an Entrepreneur was born!
We HAVE to create our OWN economy today.
Hopefully I will save you a lifetime of searching…
Click on the Image Above to Tell Me A Little About Yourself
and Perhaps We Can Work Together.
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