Last nite we held our monthly Pack meeting for the Cub Scouts. As an incentive to the boys to sell lots of popcorn, we told them that any Cub selling over a certain amount gets to put a whipped cream pie in the face of their adult leader of choice. Out of the 15 boys that qualified, I only caught two pies in the face... Man that stuff is sticky! It was fun!
This morning at Rotary Club, it's "Career Day" where we take high school juniors out to into the local business community job shadow for half a day. This is good stuff! I wish I could have done that as a high school junior. I remember in 10th grade we had to pick two careers we were considering and write a paper about each. I chose High School Band Director and Salesman/Sales Mgr. I was most recently a Mortgage Loan Officer and now I run a Chamber of Commerce, lol. Of course, the Chamber job is 110% sales so I've stayed true to form there. Every job I have had in my professional career has involved sales\consulting and mangement.
My drinking "toasted" my music career. Drugs and alcohol became much more important to me than my playing/teaching career. I simply vanished from the radar screen of the professional music teacher. I burned all my bridges in Houston and I never got back into the scene up here in Ohio when I returned home. I simply vanished. At least now, I have been playing again for a few years, and I have done some teaching here and there. So, at least I can say that I am back using the gift of music God gave me.
Our talents and passions are the gifts God gives us. What we do with our gifts is the gift we give back to God. If I could live my life a day at a time following this simple philosophy, I bet my life would be full of joy and I'd be given all that I need in order to get through life.
God's gifts to me...
a talent for speaking/presenting
a gift for teaching
a musical gift
a sense of humor
a kind heart
a desire to help others
a passion to help youth succeed
a bright mind
a talent for writing (that has gone largely undeveloped, lol)
I have never really spent much time reflecting on this principle/philosophy... I think it's time I do.
4 comments:
I misread that there for a sec, and thought you said as an incentive to sell the most, the scout who does least well gets publically whipped ..!!
I lived in Houston. I went to school at UT Medical Center, trained at MD Anderson and Hermann Hospital. Texas was a *unique* experience;)
I'm glad you got back into your music. That is a God given talent that should not be wasted.
All kinds of gifts come with sobriety. In my drinking/using days I totally lost touch with poetry, usually just ranting in print about this and that. I wanted to be a poet from the time I was seven and wrote my first poem about a fish. In my freedom from drinking and drugs, I've found my voice again, and poems sometimes pour out. I'm reading in public venues and winning prizes. I haven't worked up the courage to submit individual poems to literary journals, but I have a manuscript that I enter in competitions--very brave, that, and nothing has come of it so far. But my point is, I can live my dream in sobriety, and it gets better and better.
Chris A
I admire that you work with kids. There are so many that need a "father" figure in their lives. What a great gift you have.
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