My daughter asked me to bring her nail glue in the middle of the day.
Right away I thought, “No freaking way”.
But, then I remembered that morning how she repeatedly said how stressed out she was that her nail had just fallen off. To me, that wasn’t even close to important. I could think of 1000 things that were more important.
But I thought about her world for a second, and how in her world, nail glue was the most important solution she could find to move forward in her day. She couldn't focus on math, she couldn't focus on her drama class. With just a glimpse of that nail, her whole world spiraled.
This is going to sound insane in an already ridiculous story, but in an instant, I thought of myself as King Arthur. What would he do if he had a daughter who was captured and in a cell with no way out? He'd go rescue her, of course. No matter how important the other tasks in front of him were, he would drop everything, he would get on a white horse, take Excalibur, and save his daughter.
So what do you think I did?
I raced home, I ran upstairs, I grabbed that tiny little bottle of nail glue with the red cap and I galloped all the way to her school, ran into the front office and screamed, “nail glue!”
I don't know why I screamed, but they all looked at me like I was crazy.
That was my Excalibur. And I stood there proud.
As I signed the forms and laid the nail glue before them, one lady said, “You’re a better parent than I am”. Normally I would’ve told her no, of course that’s not true. But today I just smiled back, thinking, “Maybe, today, I am.”
Aesop of Aesop’s fables said “no act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”
Sometimes we think that we are so small. That, despite our best effort to change the world, our actions are irrelevant. We are just one small spec in this endless span of the universe. And that’s true, but we are a spec among other specs. Our actions may not change the lives of people across the world, but they affect our families, and our friends, and neighbors. We have the power to change someone’s life for the better.
We get opportunities to be the hero every day. It may not be as obvious as slaying dragons and rescuing damsels in distress, but they are still important. Simple acts of kindness can be life changing.
I'm definitely not perfect, because there's many times I go the opposite way, but I'm working on making better choices and invoking my inner King Arthur.
So when you’re making your sales calls, meeting with prospects, putting together proposals, remember how important your work is to them. That you are changing a life out there, with your small acts. Sometimes it may not seem like it as you make call after call and face an endless dose of rejection. But keep going, because for those you do reach, you’re making a major impact!
Look, you have the power to shape your destiny, so go out there and make it happen.