I’ve discovered peace is not the absence of conflict, but a condition of my spirit.
atop Steptoe Butte, Idaho, a thousand feet above the rolling hills of the Palouse area
It’s been a quick trip to the view from here. The climb’s not been easy, nor predictable. But here I stand amazed, a “senior.”
I’ve traded time for experience, and mistakes for learning. I’ve gained strength, but lost endurance. I’ve won wisdom, but lost patience. I’ve raised hope in discouragement, and grown grit from defeat.
I’ve found that storms may cross my paths, But don’t determine them.
I’ve seen tolerance harden to intolerance, And pride swell to arrogance. I’ve seen hate multiply and evil strut. But I’ve watched kindness repulse anger, Character rise undaunted, And virtue stand uncowed.
I’ve lost money, but invested in family. I’ve cried in sorrow and grieved in pain, yet laughed again. I’ve been mistreated, ordeal-sharpened, and test-refined. I’ve played and fought, joked and argued, lost and won. I’ve screamed, offended; and apologized, repentant.
I’ve added girth, assembled wrinkles, And grew perspective. I’ve failed repeatedly, But fewer than my tries. I’ve wrestled with my tongue and temper, And learned to carry more tunes than grudges.
I’ve discovered peace is not the absence of conflict, But a condition of my spirit.
I’ve known sicknesses, but not all. I’ve enjoyed health, but not always. I’ve prospered in relationships, but also in regrets. I’ve seen a lot, been through a lot, and loved a lot.
This privileged, age-afforded vista, From this spot on not-quite-over-the-hill, Reveals a journey far from perfect, Yet a scuffle worth a life invested. It satisfies my seasoned eyes, my slowing body, An agile mind, and a grateful heart.
Are we purposefully collaborating with experts from other disciplines in meeting people’s needs? And are we measuring what truly matters?
credit: Visit Philadelphia
Part of why recreation and parks doesn’t receive more of the rave respect it deserves, in my opinion, is because most people notice programs far more than the objectives behind them.
That’s not surprising. It’s always easier to focus on outward expressions than on internal improvements of the mind, body and soul.
But that’s where the common disconnect begins, I believe.
When we providers declare that recreation and parks are essential community services, what does that mean to our constituents? What is our bottom-line purpose of enabling quality leisure experiences? And are we cognizant enough of it?
• Is it just a walk in the park—or is it physical exercise, stress relief and mental rejuvenation?
• Is it merely a Paint With Me class (with wine!)—is it or stretching skills and enriching relationships?
• Is soccer practice just about scoring a trophy—or is it developing fine motor skills, building teamwork, modeling good sportsmanship, and growing cooperative social interactions among diverse teens, teams and talents?
• Is it merely an object of public art—or is it celebrating a cultural heritage, invigorating a downtown district, connecting destinations, and attracting visitors, tourists and new businesses?
• Is it just an evening activity—or is it character development, anti-ganging intervention, and preventative treatment for abusive and addictive behaviors?
Are we strategically planning with such measurable outcomes in mind, or are we satisfied that it was “fun”?
Here’s the crux: Are we building people—or just running programs? Are we purposefully collaborating with experts from other disciplines in meeting people’s needs? And are we measuring what truly matters?
Because here’s the other just-as-important part of our jobs: we must show it.
Moving beyond ROIs, attendees, and social media stats, are we documenting personal and social good in our value statements? Can we point to specific cases of cleaner resources, less waste, crises averted, problems solved, and healthier lifestyles? Are we enriching our neighbors’ lives, improving the livability of our cities, and ensuring a more equitable future?
If we are to convince a wider audience of the great worth of our indispensable services (and, in turn, influence higher funding and priorities by decision makers), we must deliver whole goods. We can’t merely insist that recreation and parks are essential, we must intentionally demonstrate it—and prove it!
I had a weird dream, which is normal for me, but unusually long. It had many connected parts, but the remarkable thing was how detailed some of the apparently important observations were. I told Carol I would write it down. “Why? So you can terrorize people?”
Scene 1. Choir practice outside on what appeared to be an elevated bed-like grassy platform. People were standing, sitting and lounging to sing. Our new choir director gave us new music with the cover filled with mostly words of different sizes and type. Near the bottom it told of Carol and me when we had our music ministry. I didn’t really read it, but I noticed it used my rovingnature email address. “Carol Rupp” was displayed in large serif font all by itself. So this must have gone way back. “Did you know about this?” I asked the choir director. She didn’t answer me, but sort-of smiled.
Scene 2. There were stones and sticks on the front edge of the bed-platform that I raked off with my hands. A planted non-descript flower in a cup appeared and I moved it to a nearby flower bed. The flower came out of the inch-deep black soil in the cup, appearing to be a long tube of some sort, with no visible roots—odd—but I put it back in and then placed the cup on the ground. Lot of good that would do.
Scene 3. Lunch at a round table: Carol, me, a non-identified person. I was quiet because I was astounded and humbled that anyone would remember our work from years ago and publish it on the front of a piece of choral music. Then there was something that covered my head, I think.
Scene 4. Waiting in a classroom with carpeting and no windows for the teachers of the NRPA Directors school to arrive. We stood and applauded when they entered through the door at the front right corner of the room. Everybody was good-naturedly teasing someone who was standing next to me. She had long red hair that hung in front of her red face. I whispered that it would be alright.
Scene 5. Cows. A mischievous brown and white Hereford calf had gotten away so I and a few others went to find it. We found it at the edge of a pasture just inside a wood and wire gate. There were 2 other Holstein milk cows there whose udders were so full they were touching the ground. So they were led away. Someone asked me to fetch the calf, so I did, but to return to where we were going, we both had to crawl through a shallow white-painted plywood box, about the size of a conductor’s podium—about four feet wide, about 6 feet long and a foot high. The hole on the back side, which is where we entered, was bigger than that on the front side. There were partitions inside. But the exit hole to crawl through on the front side was much smaller. I don’t know how the calf got through, but I couldn’t even fit my head in it. Apparently important: the rough-cut hole was square with round corners (it looked like it had been cut by hand with a coping saw), but on the right side had a narrow slot cut into it, about 2 inches from the bottom, that curved up and to the right. Obviously for my fingers to fit into to help pull me through, even though I was still holding the red leash to the calf ahead of me. I finally pushed through, popping the (apparently important) 6-penny common nails holding the lid on to emerge on the front side. (In retrospect, I don’t know why we had to crawl through it when we could have just walked over it, but Rationality never accompanies me in my dreams.) Merge into:
Scene 6. My leash was no longer attached to the calf, but to a very long, rather large model train extending 30 feet or so long that was moving through a paved playground area, where older kids had come for recess. Apparently important: the leash was attached to the train with a nice new, shiny, medium-sized snap hook. That end of the now very-long leash was blue. A teacher came out and scolded the kids for doing that to me. Not that he (meaning me) minded, but the next person to emerge from the box with a calf on a leash might. And that would be rude.
On waking I told Carol everything I could remember. What does it all mean?
You would never know it, because I’m really a whole lot older than I look, but I’m one of very few people living anymore who can boast of surviving a horse and buggy accident.
See, a long, long time ago—back when a camera, clock, calculator, phone, music player and video recorder were all separate devices—I harnessed my family into an adventure in the 19th Century.
It was Labor Day and our first visit to the Laurel Highlands of southwestern Pennsylvania. We had come to Old Bedford Village, a living history hamlet where the colonial period was full on display for the education and entertainment of its guests.
It was there we innocently boarded a wooden-wheeled carriage for a short, horse-drawn tour through the late summer countryside. Our full company included my wife Carol and me, our four children ages 3½ – 8, a young couple expecting their first child very soon, and our 80-year-old driver. Off we started at a lazy, laid-back pace.
But soon, the clip-clopped cadence of Queenie’s hooves rose from walk, to trot, to canter, to gallop. From the driver’s seat came a few, low and feeble, pleading commands—apparently so as to not startle either the passengers OR the horse: “Whoa, Queenie… whoa, Queenie…!”
But Queenie didn’t whoa. In fact, she paid no attention to the increasing cries of the little old driver or to her increasingly alarmed passengers. I aimed my bouncing head out the side window to witness the horsepower boost coming from a gray-dappled rump. The driver’s reins led to no effect on her front end, where, despite wearing blinders, her wide, wild eyes stared upward and to the right. As I followed skyward, a large colorful kite swooped into view.
Now, knowing what your problem is doesn’t always lead to an immediate solution! Oh, we understood the arithmetic all right: 1 large kite + 1 spooked horse = 1 runaway buggy filled with tender, bruisable people! But our difference-making resources from the back of the carriage were, sadly, quite limited.
Oblivious to all dangers but the kite, Queenie galloped straight ahead with her neck craned far to the right. Soon we entered an area with many people who were quickly discovering they’d better run or get run over. (Run… away! It’s a Runaway!)
Queenie slammed her neck into the corner of a building and collapsed. The buggy mounted the porch, separating spokes from rims from axles, and splintered apart. All of us hapless riders careened into the front, left corner of the buggy, piling up, as it happened, on my wife Carol.
With Queenie down and front wheels broken, our vehicle slumped on its side, making it even harder to distinguish each other’s tangled body parts in the messy heap of human cargo. Now to the rescue came the formerly fleeing refugees, who held up our fractured fairy tale of a coach long enough for us to hand the children through the side window to willing hands and helpers.
After we had all clambered from the wreck, and were gratefully awaiting minor medical attention, I realized that the camera around my neck was responsible for the gash on my forehead, and—hey!—still had one last picture left on my roll of Kodak slide film. It shows Carol on the ground holding her aching leg and knee with one hand while the other reined in our excitable 8-year-old from further unrestrained exploits.
A horse-and-buggy accident in 1989, I daresay, was a unique experience even then. Yet, like most catastrophes from which you survive, can be interpreted for a life lesson or two:
1. No matter where we are or what we’re doing, trouble can suddenly swoop out of the clear blue on us. And though it may pursue or even lead us for a while, remember that it does come, eventually, to a conclusion; and:
2. Consider yourself forewarned whenever you find yourself following a horse’s rear end!
Diagnosed with schizophrenia in his mid-twenties, my brother Brian battled depression, hallucinations, voices, anxiety, and highly threatening psychotic episodes in decades of discerning what was truly real in his reality.
As if that weren’t enough, brain cancer inserted its tentacles into his frontal lobe. He celebrated his fiftieth birthday with the first of three surgeries to counter the cancer’s terrible, inevitable advance.
On a recent Christmas evening surrounded by our family, a series of seizures convulsed his central nervous system in a hostile takeover of mind and body.
The off-kilter, razor’s edge balance of a medicated life disintegrated into a chemically-induced, frantic free-for-all for his future.
Forced to abandon his already limited lifestyle, his mobility, his interests, his hobbies, and his home, Brian’s horizons shrank to a double room in a nursing home with a single window.
His is not the archetypical story of Exalted Hero, Exemplary Leader, or Inspirational Honcho.
Yet…
Brian the mild-mannered gentleman, Brian the good-humored wit, Brian the patient and enduring soul, was ultimately the unlikely overcomer of some of life’s harshest punishments.
Though his accomplishments may be meager trifles measured against society standards; though his aims were modest and he consumed, perhaps, more than he contributed, his life, tragic as it appeared, was neither futile nor impotent.
Perhaps like many other so-called burdens to society, his purpose was intended for our collective benefit. Perhaps he was singled out to demonstrate to all of us how to bear an unfair burden. Maybe his gift of humor in the midst of a lifetime of suffering was to show us how to accept grace and how to give grace. Feasibly his sacrificial mission provided a broader perspective on our own discomforts, disappointments and disabilities. Patience through the worst of times? Decisively. Perseverance in perpetual pain? Resisting the ravages of mental and physical illness? Enduring when there simply is no other option? Emphatically yes, yes, and oh, yes!
I am sorry I came to recognize these realities late. But I rejoice in witnessing his ultimate triumph in carrying these unpleasant duties to completion at the finish line.
And to hear our Father say, “Well done, My good and faithful servant! Enter into the joy of your reward prepared in advance for you!”
Agonizing childhood Christmas tradition develops character
When I was a little kid, it was a time-honored tradition in my church that all the children of the Sunday School classes would “Say Pieces” at Christmastime and Easter.
Such were the agonizing times of Kid-dom. Whether it was memorizing and reciting a scripture verse or short poem, or playing an instrument, singing a song, or even performing a bit of drama, it was a stressful time on Center Stage.
Not that it was a big one. But that didn’t matter. It was all the mandatory preparation and the grown-ups’ stern warnings about getting it right in front of everybody. It was a big deal.
… Not that I can remember any piece of any of the Pieces I ever recited…
But many of them were quite similar to the now well-known declaration of Buddy the Elf: “The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear!” You know, when you’re a little impressionable kid, that’s really a huge pile of words to get just right.
I do, however, remember how we got to dress in plaid bathrobes to play Shepherds Abiding in the Fields. And how, one Eastertime, my cousin wore his green plastic army helmet to play a Roman soldier.
The annual production spared no one. Even the really little kids, the ones who were too little to even know what was going on, were sent out there. This cherished image is of my little sister Ann and her friend Jimmy, who paraded holding hands all the way from the staging area behind the upright piano to the platform, faced the audience with the signs hung around their little cherubic necks, then returned to wild acclaim.
Our individual and collective behaviors solicited both pride and embarrassment in our parents. For our grandparents and all the other old people, the spectacle was highly entertaining.
Afterwards, back in the classroom, we’d be rewarded with a small box of mixed chocolates and an orange from our Teacher: Presents! Next up: the real deal with Santa at home—yeah!
Despite all the trauma however, the ordeal developed character—not that we cared. But it did force us into such real out-of-the-comfort-zone growth experiences as public speaking, addressing an audience of peers and authority figures, overcoming fears and nervousness, exercising brain power, learning new information and how “practice makes perfect.”
I also remember how one little girl learned the power of a bribe. (Or shall I say “incentivized reward.”) All through the rehearsals, she refused to go on stage. But then her mother discovered just the right enticement in the promise of a special lollipop. (Did she bring some for all of us?) When it came to it, the girl delivered forthrightly, then ran directly to claim her reward from Mom hiding behind the piano.
After all these years, I’ve come to value sharing My Piece. It’s proclaimed a little differently now, and disseminated on a blog in a way no one could have imagined so long ago. Yet the sharing of our thoughts, concepts, ideas and ideals in a public forum remains a noble and cherished cause of personal expression and communal liberty.
So I now choose to share with you one of my favorite Pieces this Christmastime. It was written by the Nobel Prize winner of Literature in 1928, Sigrid Undset:
And when we give each other Christmas gifts in His name, let us remember that He has given us the sun and the moon and the stars, and the earth with its forests and mountains and oceans—and all that lives and moves upon them. He has given us all green things and everything that blossoms and bears fruit and all that we quarrel about and all that we have misused—and to save us from our foolishness, from all our sins, He came down to earth and gave us Himself.
And as Ann and Jimmy so endearingly express: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
the learning legacy of engaging peers in free-spirited, unsupervised outdoor play
Chapman Quarries is the smallest incorporated borough in Pennsylvania, with a population in the 2010 census of 199 people. It’s where my dad’s family was established, and where his dad, granddad, and nearly all his male relatives worked the slate quarries.
While I didn’t grow up in town, that’s where church was and where my cousins and grandparents lived and where I spent a good amount of time. And it was the only place apart from school recess where I was able to freely interact with a lot of other kids outdoors. Three childhood memories tell a connected story:
Ice skating on the dam. The nearby quarries both used and generated a lot of water, and before Hurricane Agnes’ flood broke it in 1972, the dam was an idyllic nook in the woods. All the kids would walk out the back of town down “the dam hill” to amuse ourselves on the frozen lake. (It was a good joke to tell the new preacher about “the dam hill!”) I wasn’t a very good skater and I remember my cousin Judy telling me that I spent more time lying on the ice than skating on it. The older kids would build a bonfire off to the side, and we’d spend the better part of the whole day freezing, thawing, and “just messing around,” as we called it, with never a grown-up in sight.
Skateboarding on Main Street. The town was founded on a great hill after slate deposits were discovered in the 1850s, which brought an influx of hard-working families from Cornwall, Wales and Devon to work the quarries. When the skateboard craze hit some hundred-plus years later, it drew all their young descendants to Main Street with short, metal-wheeled boards to mess around. (Metal wheels were the leftover technology from roller-skates, which took a special key to adjust on your feet. And—let me tell you—roller skating on uneven slate sidewalks just wasn’t even fun!) I remember my cousin Craig telling me I had to get a skateboard with clay wheels—they’d work a lot better and I wouldn’t be spending all that time lying on the concrete than riding atop it. Like sledding, we’d walk to the top of the hill and ride the boards straight down the center of town, pausing only when someone would yell “CAR!” The old folks in town wished we wouldn’t go so fast because they didn’t want to see us get hurt. But no one stopped us.
Swimming in Claude’s Pond. Deep, water-filled Fisher’s Quarry was the destination of choice for the older teen boys to go skinny-dipping and wash up when it was hot. (This had also been the common practice of all the previous generations.) But I had that opportunity only once, living out of town as I did. Instead, my pappy would occasionally drive me and my brother and sister and a couple of cousins to his friend’s farm pond where we’d go wading and swimming and messing around. The older teen boys would drive there themselves and bring a long wooden plank. They’d extend it over the deep end of the pond and secure it with one of their jalopy’s front wheels to create a perfect diving board. The bigger boys allowed me, as a non-swimmer, to take a few turns, and after some tentative jumps into the shallows, I ignored my own caution and jumped out as far as I could. I remember my cousin Robert hauling me out of the water, saying that I shouldn’t spend more time lying on the bottom than floating on the top.
I learned a lot from my cousins. And from going outside and getting involved.
Like mine, most Baby Boomers’ childhoods were characterized by the habitual frequency in which we engaged our peers in free-spirited, unsupervised, outdoor play. It was there that we learned leadership and cooperation in picking teams for a pick-up game, and creative problem-solving in building a treehouse over a creek. We exerted our bodies while managing risk, and stretched our imaginations while messing around. We discovered both ourselves and our places when we pushed our limitations and our possibilities. Our self-development sprung from self-reliance.
A copious body of research now proves what we then knew, but didn’t understand: that social interaction in connection to nature is essential for our physical and mental health and our intellectual and social development. May we extend that legacy to both encourage and enable it with our children—and theirs.
Something has gone drastically wrong and, like it or not, you’re involved. What now?
Say you’re the supervising engineer at Three Mile Island when the alarms indicate a nuclear meltdown in progress. – Or the CEO of Johnson & Johnson when someone poisons your brand’s Tylenol capsules. – Or the County Sheriff as massive wildfires advance in a constricting ring around your residents. – Or the Malaysian Prime Minister when Russia shoots down your passenger airliner. – Or the Captain of a cruise ship when it runs aground off the coast of Italy and capsizes. – Or the Director of Recreation when a new and violent gang claims your skatepark as its turf. – Or the Office Manager when an underling hasn’t properly filled out his TPS Report.
Granted, crises come in all sorts and sizes of potential career-sinkers, and managing them and their responses is never a pleasant task. For a leader in a crisis, it is baptism by fire. Not only is it critical to deal effectively with the immediate consequences, it is crucial to the wellbeing of the innocent, the guilty, the present and future. And as the above examples attest, the caliber of leadership during the crisis, good or bad, makes all the difference in the eventual outcome.
So while you may be spared an international incident or two, as a leader in your organization you will see your share of corporate crises and unmitigated mayhem. And although these successful tactics work at all times, (practice them in peacetime!) here are five never-fail strategies for growing your leadership credibility during a crisis, and enabling a better yet-to-come:
Remain composed instead of clamorous. There’s enough crazy: adding to it only exacerbates the problem. When the sky is falling, people crave a leader who keeps his or her head when everyone else is losing theirs. In the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers, those who controlled their panic were able to lead countless others to safety before the buildings’ imminent collapse. Firefighters and other emergency personnel proved themselves the best in the midst of the worst by remaining calm in the calamity. Keep cool in a crisis to fill a crucial leadership need.
Offer clarity instead of confusion. Many in a crisis become instantly consumed with demanding to know why. And while that may be crucial to prevent a repeat catastrophe, it usually doesn’t address the “what” of the immediate need. When Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans, its victims needed to be rescued, sheltered, and provided for. Debating the contentious and confusing issues of levee management, evacuation policies and public administration failures needed to be reserved for the mop-up. Offer clear, coherent and direct solutions to alleviate the immediate needs.
Be considerate instead of caustic. In a crisis, there’s usually plenty of blame to go around. And while some insist in loudly pointing fingers, it changes nothing. Belligerence is not becoming of a leader. But compassion is, and it seeks the best solutions for the most people. Immigrants streaming illegally into the southwestern U.S. create inestimable problems for individuals and governments on both sides of the border, but intolerance for others’ viewpoints and situations never produces a sustainable solution. Discern realities with compassion and direct resolutions with care.
Exude confidence with courage. Courage comes from acting despite threat, uncertainty, fear or peril. Like a tonic, faith in an idea, a resolution, or a better future helps enable it, especially when that confidence becomes contagious and the vision is caught by your followers. In coordinating a massive international response to the recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the World Health Organization is combatting the viral plague in a setting of “extreme poverty, dysfunctional health systems, a severe shortage of doctors, and rampant fear.” Yet its dedicated health workers, armed with hope and courageously immersing themselves in the epidemic, are the ones who will ultimately make a difference in defeating the deadly disease. Seize tomorrow’s solutions with certainty to solve today’s distresses with confidence.
Bring competence with candor. Education is an invaluable investment in developing crisis leadership when its lessons are judiciously and honestly applied. For when you later find yourself in the pits, you’ll discover your capacity is deeper still, and provides a way up and out. In the first major foreign crisis of the U.S. after the Cold War, Iraq invaded neighboring Kuwait, destabilizing the entire Mid East. Operation Desert Storm’s General Norman Schwarzkopf, characteristically forthright to his Commander-in-Chief, his troops and the world at large, led his well-trained forces to liberate Kuwait in just 100 hours. Shape your professional edge with training and hone it with integrity.
MasterPoint:Character in crisis creates credibility in command.
Respect is the blue chip stock of social capital. Investing it in pays large and growing dividends.
It isn’t image. It’s not the money. And it isn’t power, prestige or even political capital: What drives both progress and profits inside every organization is a simple thing called respect.
Universally recognized and traded (“It’s everywhere you want to be!”), respect is the currency of people on the move, who know and work its profitable exchange rate in the commerce of getting things done.
Leaders in every industry deal primarily in social capital—networks of social connections, interpersonal relationships, and shared values and ethics, that enable and encourage mutually advantageous cooperation toward shared ambitions. And respect is the blue chip stock of social capital. Investing it in pays large and growing dividends.
Yet as exalted as this lucrative performer is, respect is a stock in trade that cannot be bought—only earned. Here are 12 guaranteed ways to stop yearning and start earning respect:
1. Give it. Treating others the way you want to be treated is not just an ancient adage, but remains a golden rule for living today. In the economy of respect, the more you give, the more you gain: confer courtesy, bestow honor, and dish out dignity—and you’ll earn many happy returns.
2. Practice self-respect. Despite your own faults and failures (everyone has a slew of them), know that you are worthy of high esteem and unbiased regard. Treat yourself accordingly. Unsubscribe from the steady stream of negative self-talk and invest instead in a constructively healthy lifestyle.
3. Be authentic. Say what you mean and mean what you say. Avoid duplicitous talk and vague vows. Wear no masks; build no facades. Be sincere in all your conversations and genuine in all your compliments. Be the real you all the time.
4. Stay open to criticism. Since no one’s perfect—including you—remain humble and teachable to advance through your mistakes and setbacks. If you can take it on the chin without running off at the mouth, both your restraint and resolve will be duly noted and respected by others.
5. Be discreet. Gossiping and talking behind someone’s back reflects worse on you than your victim. Respecting other’s confidences builds your own trustworthy character.
6. Be professional. Know your job and be good at it. Producing outcomes without excuses and results beyond expectations shows both accountability and dependability. Grow in competence to build a stellar reputation and harvest honor.
7. Know what and why you believe, and act on it. Living and leading by a moral code shows you are committed to integrity, purpose, and responsibility. Believe in your own ideals and ideas and be able to intelligently support them in the marketplace.
8. Keep your word. Honor the integrity of your own commitments. Promptly returning phone calls and emails, consistently meeting deadlines, and intentionally delivering on all your promises not only stands out against the mediocre crowd, but also builds trust, loyalty, gratitude and esteem from your peers.
9. Champion others. No matter what the relationship, seek to add value to other people by actively supporting the right to their views and their contributions to the cause. Stand up for others, especially those who can’t for themselves.
10. Listen emphatically. Nothing speaks louder in terms of valuing other people than genuinely listening to them. Seek not to merely appear to hear, but comprehend and understand. Exuding genuine empathy is powerfully endearing, and helps you make a difference in a person’s life.
11. Be generous. People admire those who give their time, talent and resources to help them reach their goals. Be lavish with praise, bighearted in attitude, charitable with assistance and liberal in sharing.
12. Stay relentlessly positive. Maintaining a perpetually positive outlook nurtures the best results in overcoming challenges, developing relationships, evolving solutions, fulfilling potential, generating respect, and attracting reputable associates.
Sweet! The Hershey Company is the largest producer of chocolate in North America and a global leader in chocolate and sugar confectionery. With revenues of more than $6.6 billion in 2012, Hershey offers much-loved products under more than 80 brand names, including such iconic brands as Hershey’s, Reese’s, Kit Kat, Twizzlers and Jolly Rancher.
But the industry giant started inauspiciously enough with a rural farm boy lacking a formal education who apprenticed to a Lancaster, Pennsylvania candy maker. Milton S. Hershey went on to become not only one of America’s wealthiest individuals, but also a successful entrepreneur whose products are known the world over, a visionary builder of the town that bears his name and a philanthropist whose open-hearted generosity continues to touch the lives of thousands.
I recently enjoyed reading a biography of this intriguing man (Hershey: Milton S. Hershey’s Extraordinary Life of Wealth, Empire, and Utopian Dreams, by Michael D’Antonio). Here are a couple of exemplary lessons from his life for our mutual inspiration:
Persistent Improver. As a young entrepreneur, Milton Hershey failed repeatedly as a candy maker in Lancaster, Philadelphia, Denver, Chicago and New York City. After 14 years, he returned home to Lancaster and started over once again, this time improving on a recipe for caramels he learned in Colorado. His successful Lancaster Caramel Company became an early model for production line methods that Henry Ford later perfected.
Risk-Taker and Self-Believer. After selling the caramel company to a competitor for $1 million in 1900, he invested all his energies in developing a new concoction then finding favor in Europe: milk chocolate. Without even knowing how to produce a marketable milk chocolate recipe or a process for a stable and consistent chocolate bar, he bought the necessary equipment and began construction on a new factory.
Fearless Experimenter. Even after he was very wealthy and successful, Milton remained a tinkerer, always on the lookout for new products and productivity. But he was never afraid to fail in his open-minded experiments—like his ill-fated attempts to boost vitamins in his chocolate by mixing in turnips, parsley, beets, and even celery! Nor did he complain of the costs associated with such experiments.
Foresighted Planner and Builder. As a social progressive who transformed his philosophies into realities, he constructed a company town for his workers that thrived devoid of problems associated with other utopian enterprises of the times. The picturesque settlement of 14,000 residents today takes pride in its uniquely attractive design, and the livability and lifestyle it affords. Dubbed “The Sweetest Place on Earth,” its other popular attractions include Hersheypark, Hersheypark Stadium, ZooAmerica, Hershey Gardens, as well as the Penn State Hershey Medical Center.
Visionary Provider. Unable with this wife Catherine to have children of their own, Milton founded a school for orphan boys in 1909, and later donated his entire fortune to a foundation to administer the school. Today, with assets of more than $10 billion (more than that of most universities!), the coeducational school provides a free world-class education, as well as meals, clothing, a nurturing home, health care, counseling and career training to nearly 2,000 children in social and financial need.
MasterPoint:Dream Big. Try Big. Live Big. Leave Big.
