Watch when you say, “I will never do that”. You most likely will have a chance to retract those words and proceed with that task. #000111
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Never Say Never
By Gary Shotton
Hello my name is Gary Shotton, and today we’re going to talk about the subject of our saying that goes like this. Never say never. You know, my dad was an inspiration to me, he, I look back, he’s been passed on. Many years ago, now, and yet I go back and think of some of his little sayings and slogans and this was one of them. Never say never. What did he mean, well, we’re going to be in situations that we never dreamed we would ever be doing what we’re doing now? And at some point, possibly we said it, or thought I would never do that. And I’m talking about things that are moral and ethically sound. It just stopped that we would never, ever want to do, let me give a quick example. I see every once in a while, a young boy, maybe nine years old, and they have a little brother or sister that’s like two or one and a half and I joke with him I say Hey, Johnny. Are you helping change the diapers yet? And that little boys out never do that. Well, wait. When that that little Johnny grows up to be daddy, he’s going to be up there changing somebody’s diapers.
So, at one point, he thought he would never be changing a dirty diaper, but he’s happy to do it now, because that’s what the job calls for. My dad was one of these guys that man he did not shy away from anything that was work he did not shy away from anything that was risk. He was a risk taker, and that got him into situations where he probably said man, I probably say I’d never would do this but I’m doing it now. Just to think make things ends meet or things work out. I’ll just go through my career just a little quickly here. I was my first job out of college was an engineer, I’m graduated as an engineer in mineral processing, and my one and only corporate job was for nine and a half years. And you know, we took this mineral out of the ground and we ground it up, and we put it in a bag for its particular use. And I thought to myself, I would have never thought that I’m taking dirt, it wasn’t actually dirt but it was like it was a clay. And I’m grinding up dirt and putting it in a bag.
Well, you know we’re designing the, the processes and systems to do that, but our plant was dirty, that was one of my jobs, early on as a job this plant is so dirty that we’re getting people with lung cancer and lung problem and we’re wearing masks to keep the dust out of our lungs but that’s not working. And so, I got through college said, Man, I would have said I’d never been doing that. I have some rent homes, okay. That means I buy homes I have read them out to people and I get a check from Rihanna, sometimes through this last 1012 years or so that I’ve done that or more. I have gone out to fix the plumbing, and it happens to be the wallets tool, and I could call a plumber, but I’m going to save a little money by doing it myself. And here I find myself, I just look at myself and think wow, I would never hug the commode, and that’s the toilet stool, and I’m in order to reach behind the toilet stool here I am. I’m hugging this commode I’m like reaching around with my face right there by the seat of a commode, I would have never done.
Yeah, I’ll do that to say, $150, because I can do it in just a few minutes I’ll do that. So, I thought well maybe I would never do that. I transferred from being that engineer a little high pay pretty good job company vehicle to my first business that I own and it was a moving and storage company where we
move furniture, and I would have never thought I’d be a truck driver. I currently carry and, and have the certification to drive the largest biggest truck semi-truck on the highway here in the United States. I would have never thought I’d be a truck driver, it’s not a bad occupation but I thought I could have said I would never be a truck driver because it’s not doesn’t match with being a high paid engineer, I did it. I, as a part of that company, owning that company I had to load furniture, so I would go out hot days, hot, so hot you could hardly stand up, sweating, are so cold that you couldn’t, you couldn’t get enough coats on, and you’re walking in carrying a furniture to the chair to the second floor.
Third floor up, you know, a long walk, you’re rolling things you’re sweating. It’s hard work. I would have said I’d never do that but I did, you know, life takes us down a path, and I kind of think it’s an issue of really swallowing our pride. Now, I’m not asking you anything, unsafe for yourself, anything that’s immoral that’s totally off the plate. But when I say I will never do something, I think there’s something that could happen if it’s a pride issue that will circle the course, and you will be faced with that challenge that you’re going to need to do that. And you’re going to have to swallow your pride and go ahead and do something you thought you would never do. I’ll just take it a little further on that, I’d say, I’ve owned companies I own this company, I can’t do every job physically, mentally, at this point in my life, but I will tell you that I would never ask someone to do something that I would not be willing to do myself, and probably have done it myself.
We had some sewer problems and we had somebody had to get down into a dig wasn’t sewer that much, but they’re digging in the dirt down about four or five feet. I would have done that now I didn’t do it but I, they knew I wasn’t asking them to do something that I wouldn’t be willing to do myself and I’ve probably already done it already done that in my life so that brings along, kind of a check and balance when you’re asking other people to do things, would I be willing to do this yeah, I’d be willing to do that. So, somehow, being willing to do things that we’re not normally thinking are in our job description and our, our expectation, somehow, I believe that qualifies us to be handed more challenges more things, more. It’s kind of like graduating from third grade to fourth grade or fourth grade to fifth grade in a school progression.
I believe that being willing to do things that we thought we would never do qualifies us for more and better things. And sure, I hire people to do a lot of things for me that I would not do now probably physically, I’m not going to climb up on a ladder right now it’s not that logical, I might fall off. I’m not afraid of that, but it’s logical for me not to do that so I let somebody younger climb a ladder but I have climbed ladders, I’ve been up in the air. And so, that’s the point. I hope these are helpful, I wish you had asked you to share these be a part of our team, if you know somebody that would be a good speaker, we asked you to nominate them go to our website. We are here to Inspire Better Business. Thank you.
