Today, I want to let you in on a little secret. I suffer from the shinny object syndrome. I am one of those people who haven’t stood their ground, but instead, I have jumped from one thing to another and that is the reason I have not been extremely successful. Once I have done something to a degree of success and it starts working for me, I get bored and move on. It doesn’t matter what it is, or how much money I have made, I move on for one reason or another.
My wife once told me I am afraid of success and I took offence to this and really did not believe her. She was on the outside looking in. Not to mention, she is the one who have experienced the roller-coaster ride with me. So, I really should have given her more credit because she was only trying to get me the to see some of my misgivings. Over the years I have started many businesses and with some degree of success. I have a door to door shampoo cleaning business, at the same time I also ran a computer repair shop, while working a full-time job. I owned and operated an advertising company for two years with a great deal of beginner’s luck or success, whatever you want to call it.
At one point, I and my family delivered newspapers which was Ironic, because my first job as a kid was a paperboy. Several years later when I became sixteen years old, I needed another job and found one as a New York Post newspaper sales boy. Yes! You guess it, I was one of those young teenagers who was very shy around new people and thought that selling newspapers to a bunch of fast-moving individuals with short patience would help me break through being shy around strangers.
My First Job
Well, I was right! My first day as a newspaper sales boy was not good to say the lease. I sold two newspapers out of one bundle of twenty-five. When I took the bundle of unsold newspapers back to the carrier, the supervisor comment; “kid did you even try to sell any newspapers? This may not be for you. You have to open your mouth.” I was literally embarrassed of how he chewed me out in front of so many people. I said to myself while he was belittling me in front of everyone else, I was never coming back and convince myself what the supervisor said was true. It was an impressionable time for me and my self-confidence was very low at the time, didn’t help matters either.
I know I digressed off topic, but I promise to be short. Right after the supervisor crushed any change of me coming back, I thought. Something strange happened. There was a man who would almost sell out every day, and you would not believe this, he would sell a staggering two-hundred to three-hundred and fifty newspapers daily in the heart of Manhattan in only two in half hours. This man said; “don’t quit kid, because everyone has what it takes to be successful if only, they summoned the courage inside themselves and believe what they were doing was possible for themselves.”
The Discovery
He urged me to come back the following day and ask for three bundles of newspapers and remember I felt when I sold only two newspapers. The following morning, I got up and bought the New York Post in the morning and read it cover to cover and remembered some of the major stories and an hour before I was to start selling I read the paper again and realize some of the lead stories have changed. I took my three bundle and swallowed my fear and talked about the lead stories and sold all my newspapers. I also realized something else that day. I made a whopping seventy-five dollars in tips. What an amazing thing I thought. I only had to believe it was possible and go out there and do it.
I believe that was the birth of my shinning object syndrome. I stayed with the newspapers, for only the summer and moved on to other things and kept moving, never really stopping to grow and mature into any position in life. Without the proper guidance or left unchecked we can go through life living in this vicious cycle not even realizing it is happening to us. Other people from the outside looking in can see it clearly. However, we who suffer from it remain totally clueless to its existence in our life.
Finding the Solution
Finding a real solution that works for me is not easy, but crucial to finding lasting success before I leave this world. We all want to be able to leave our mark in this world, one way or another with the feeling we have made it a better place having been in it than not. I serious believe in the new birth of a lasting idea that would change our lives for the better. I have often talked about it in previous blog post, and that is; I must examine my “WHY.”
I must also learn to stand my ground in the mist of a new shinny object, something new, or even more money. I must be true to myself and find what really matters the most to me, for me. If you are anything like me, you have to find what really makes you tick. What will get you up early in the morning and have you going to bed late? That something that will supersede all other ideas and transcend into harmony in your life. I believe when I do this the success will follow. I believe that for you as well.
Sure, it is easier said than done. I look around and see so many people who know what they want and go after it with laser focus. I envy them, because I was never like that. I also know where the laser focus comes from. It is that one thing they believe in, that one thing they desire and aspire to. It is the driving force behind every breath they take for which their belief is predicated on. It is that undeniable passion which meets determination fueled by action that creates the results they long for and achieve. It is truth of one self’s ultimate destiny of an emotional purpose with no other foreseeable option but the result for which they seek.
So, many people like me may have wondered, or perhaps asked, thought to themselves, or even day-dreamed. How do I find my purpose? How do I find the one thing that I can get behind with purpose on purpose to live and die for? I honestly cannot answer that question for anyone else, but perhaps can offer a little advice. We are all here for a purpose and born with talents and a measure of gifts. It is our duty I believe to seek the very things out that we are good at that comes naturally and for which offers us the greatest amount of peace in our spirit, hearts, and mind.
Many of us who go from one shinny object to another, meaning move from one great idea to the next, one job to another for more money and better benefits consistently. Must realize we have to stop running. We have to stand our ground for what we believe in for ourselves. If we don’t have something for which to believe in, we can always find something through various different groups, along with reading a great deal of books to find that one thing you can believe in for yourself.
The key to this is to start believing in yourself with nothing wavering. “For he that wavereth is like the wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.” James 1:6. If you cannot do this on your own seek out help from others who are professional in helping you discover a better way.
As always, I hope this will enlighten and uplift some. Thank you for reading my post. I am a constant work in progress and always seek to better than I have done in the pass. Have a great day! And don’t forget, STAND YOUR GROUND!
