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The Joy of Survival
Written by: James ChanArticle Overview: We need to celebrate when we feel joyful. Those are among life's precious moments that make our journey worthwhile.
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The Joy of Survival
Today I walked into the bank where I opened my first account when I started my business. That was 1983. I had very little money, though the bank was happy to take all I had.
I had a dream I was convinced would work. Worrying comes naturally to me, so of course I had some trepidation, but I also felt the thrill of making a bold move that was going to change and improve my life.
When I needed some money to get the business going, though, I found that the bank did not share my enthusiasm. The reason was simple. I didn~{!/~}t have a job. I was a bad risk. Only by getting someone who was employed to vouch for me could I get any money at all.
At the time, the bank was Philadelphia National Bank. A few years later, my business was a little bigger, the bank was called CoreStates, and none of the people I dealt with before were still working there. Now the bank is called First Union, and there~{!/~}s a whole new cast of characters. I have to call North Carolina to get anything accomplished.
I~{!/~}m not happy that the people who turned me down for a loan have lost their jobs. They were only following the institution~{!/~}s standards. But their situation does remind me that the supposed stability of full-time employment is often an illusion. I~{!/~}m still only a one-man operation, but I~{!/~}m still here and making a living at what I like to do.
I think of one of my first clients, a corporate executive I had always seen, and depended on, to have an extraordinarily stable work situation. He worked for an impetuous, eccentric, somewhat arbitrary man, a former entrepreneur who had invented an extremely successful product. ~{!0~}Every day as I was driving to work,~{!1~} my client told me later, ~{!0~}I had the idea in the back of my mind that today was the day I would either be fired or quit.~{!1~} This went on for 17 years, and then one day he was right.
In the years I have been in business for myself, I have had many fears and have learned to live with them. I don~{!/~}t ever want to feel that my career depends on another person~{!/~}s whim. Maybe that~{!/~}s what makes my client such a good employee, while I~{!/~}m destined to be independent.
As I walked home from the bank, I had a feeling, not of elation exactly, but of really deep satisfaction. I don~{!/~}t own a Rolex, unless you count the one I bought from a street vendor in Bangkok. I~{!/~}ve never felt I needed a Mercedes. But success can happen in less showy, less expensive ways. I have helped people. I have enjoyed myself. There is no need to live in fear, or lurch from crisis to crisis.
The point is to keep your head up, to follow your heart, to ride out the highs and lows. While the bank saw me as an accident waiting to happen, I saw myself as an individual about to be realized. And I was right.
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Article Tags: 17 years, back of my mind, bad risk, bold move, corestates, corporate executive, entrepreneur, fears, first union, full time, illusion, job, man operation, national bank, north carolina, philadelphia, stable work, time employment, trepidation, work situation
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