The Inside of My Mind..

So with March came an absolute explosion in our industry. Sales returned with a fury and yours truly has been busier than ever. I have seen all the hard work that I have done all last year helping to get the NJ office off the ground pay off in spades. A lot of people have asked me how I manage to stay busy while the rest of the world seems to be continuing to “wait it out”. After all the different blogs I have written I feel that now may be a good time to write one that gives people a more inside look as to how I operate.

Now the thing is with me, I don’t march to the beat of anyone’s drum but my own. I don’t do things the “conventional way” and I don’t follow a set routine. The answer lies within the question. While many people “wait it out” and sit on their couch waiting for CNN to report that the recession is over, I set out and overturn those rocks and find diamonds. I refuse to sit and hold off and not pursue my dreams and chase my goals until the so called “economy” revives itself.

It’s probably a good time to set the disclaimer here. The opinions here in this blog are mine and mine alone. I don’t believe in censoring myself if I feel something isn’t true or right. I don’t go with the flow or follow the just because. When the world says take the road to the right, I tend to say “why the frig can’t we see what’s to the left?” That’s just the way I am. Some like it some don’t. The thing is with me, I don’t put up a fight or have an attitude about it. I just tend to be myself with the volume turned up. I live life to the fullest. I take each day as a new opportunity and I seize it. We’re only on this earth for a short time, why waste it.

I don’t believe any politician is better than the other. I don’t believe in labeling my beliefs into some silly catch phrase or social class. I speak for no one but myself and I truly believe that when it comes to religion, politics, education, and raising children, people have totally lost all concept of reality, yet somehow I’m the insane one for my love of pro wrestling, go figure.

So here’s the deal. Each day I get up at about 5:30am. I don’t really use an alarm clock since I’m always up at the same time every day, even on weekends. Five-Six hours of sleep and I’m good to go. I either hit the gym in the am or the evening and from 8:30am-5:30/6:00pm it’s game time, sometimes longer. When I’m at work, I block out all worldly issues and just focus on my work. I used to stress myself out for no reason over things that I really had no control over. I would lose focus and become easily distracted. When I was at work, I’d be worried about household tasks and vice versa. When I was at the gym, I’d be thinking of things I had to get done later. I would get lazy, get distracted and lose all my concentration. I didn’t rule my own life, my life ruled me.

It’s when things get this hectic where you learn to just give in and breathe. You have to just let go and be the person you know you are deep down. Life can be one big mind game and if you let it get the best of you, you’ll never truly be at peace. Over the years I’ve learned to control my impulsions, be a little less cynical and focus on the positive. Things will always have added stress but what can you do? Flip out and scream? Maybe that will help for a whole 5 seconds, but that’s 5 seconds wasted. You gotta learn to breathe. I did. It wasn’t easy but over time you begin to realize that one simple day of frustration will be so easily forgotten in a lifetime of happiness ahead. It used to be work was my life. Now my wife and family are my life, and my work is my work. That’s all it should be. It’s balanced and I feel I’m more successful for it.

How this relates to my day to day? Simple. There are so many people that live in fear. Fear of what may happen in such an “unstable” economy. Fear of what may be the end result of politicians having a verbal battle royal on CNN over the Healthcare in our country. To me, there’s never been a time to upgrade your business equipment, buy into a new business or help make some changes to help increase your product offerings. Now trust me, I’ve been house hunting for a while so I’ve heard the whole “never been a better time to buy” crap so I am only relating this to the Digital Graphics Industry. Disclaimer number 2!

In my line of work, and the customers I deal with, my job is not to go in and “sell them something” and I almost find it insulted to say “he’s my sales man” Salesmen have a goal and it’s summed up in two words, “to sell”. I do more than sell. I provide. There is a HUGE difference. I work with my accounts on a more personal one on one basis and they have access to me 24/7 (Trust me some have taken me up on that). My customers know they can call on me anytime day or night for advice or assistance. Salesmen don’t do that. I do.

When I was growing up, there’s was only one thing I ever truly wanted to be, a professional wrestler. Oh my word. Did he just really write that? Of all the things in the world why a wrestler? Oh the horror! Yup, I admired the those guys. I watched it religiously. But it wasn’t until about 5-6 years ago where I realized what I truly admired about those guys. The passion. Sure I loved the matches, but it was the concept of the whole thing that drew me. These were guys, everyday people like me and you, that went out and gave everything they had to entertain and to provide their fans, and customers so to speak, with the absolute best money can buy.

Their stories showed them rising above any adversity that was thrown at them. And just like in our business, there are wrestlers that succeed and wrestlers that don’t. There are companies that just do enough to put money in their pockets, and there are guys who provide so much value and superior service to their customers that the people they work with feed off their energy and learn to turn the volume up themselves.

That’s what I do. That’s who I am. I live and breathe everything I do in this business. I tell my customers my opinion and help them reach a goal and guide them in the right direction. I show more enthusiasm and genuine passion for not just this industry, but for the people I work for and believe in that more and more people each day want to get on board for the ride. There isn’t a single thing on the face of this Earth that I do better than provide valuable solutions to my customers day in and day out, and it’s that passion that gives me the ability to say there isn’t a company around that does what we do, and if there was, I’d be employed there.

Now where do we go from here? There’s a whole new world out there to seize for yourselves. Each day there are over a thousand new opportunities that present themselves. You can sit around, count your pennies and spend half the day to see who has the lowest price on a roll of 24” Oracal vinyl. Or you can just order the damn roll of material, get your job done right and move on to the next one. I’ve tried many times to explain to customers, you can sit and do your best to save your pennies, but who is doing all the work while you’re number crunching.

Fact is, life is not one big infomercial, which by the way are usually on at 5am for a reason. Not to get off subject, but if I was able to make $30,000 a month running websites on the internet, I surely wouldn’t spend time in a Hawaiian shirt with a bunch of dorks talking about how I did it while two women who show more cleavage than talent try to sell me on it. But I digress.

Bottom line, in order to truly be successful, we have to undo all the negative thinking. We have to be more responsible for our actions and remember why we got into the business in the first place. Our love and passion. Nobody gets in the business to save money. They get into business to MAKE money. I’ve made a good amount of money for myself by taking my love, my passion, my sweat, my tears and everything I have and putting into this business. It what makes me truly believe I can do it better than the next. Some call it arrogance, but I don’t get paid to come out and say I’m second fiddle.

Anyway, there you have it. It may seem like a ramble, but this is what runs through my mind when it comes to this business. I live it. I breathe it and it’s a culmination of all my hard work and energy. For those reading, I hope if anything, this helps fire you up like it does me. You don’t need a framed poster on your wall from a Poster Shop in the mall to tell you’re great and motivate you. You can do that yourself by digging down deep and finding what you’re truly made of. When you do, simply grab the knob and turn the volume way up.