From outside the box

When I was 14 years old our family car was a 1955 Pontiac. At the time I was into reading hot rod magazines and fantasizing about custom cars. One summer day I got the bright idea that I could customize our Pontiac. I Don't know why my mom gave me permission to do this, but I think I convinced her that I knew what I was doing and it would turn out beautiful. So armed with a hammer and a screw driver, I decided that I was going to start with the dashboard. I had no money and no experience, but in my youthful innocence I was sure I could customize that dashboard and make it look like the dashboards in the magazines.

Two hours later I realized that all I was capable of doing was screwing up the dashboard, which I had done quite well. Gages were hanging by wires and dents were everywhere. This was one of those defining moments in life, I never forgot that experience.

Years later, back in the early nineties, I spent thousands of dollars developing a nutritional supplement. After I figured out how to make it, had it tested, got my bar code, had it labeled and bottled, had a shop to produce and sell it out of, and even had my 800 phone number, I went to work on selling the product. By now I was broke and had racked up my credit cards to about $12,000. I thought that finding a distributor for my product would be a snap, but it wasn't. I quickly learned about the catch 22 in trying to promote a new product. Stores would only buy it thru a distributor, and a distributor wouldn't touch it unless it had proven itself in stores.

As I dismantled my shop and started giving away the remainder of my product, I remember thinking, "Here I go again, banging on the dashboard of the Pontiac". I have used that phrase often since then because I have this tendency to test out how cold the water is by jumping in.

Life gives us every lesson we need and if we don't learn the lesson, it comes around again. My style of learning lessons is to screw up so many times that by the time I get the lesson, I've got it down quite well. I still have a tendency to jump into things head first, but time is slowly tempering me, the lesson is beginning to sink in. The lesson for me that I need to learn is to do more research on a project before I invest too much of my time into it or to think before I speak and make a total ass out of myself.

I still put the cart before the horse more often than I should. But on the other hand, I have discovered and uncovered a lot of precious gems in life because of my nature to experiment, try new and untested ideas, and just jump into things. I don't always error on the side of caution, but I do ask myself every now and then the important question...."Do I know what I'm doing here or am I just banging on the dashboard of the Pontiac?"