Mason

Do you ever have those periods of time where you feel like you can't win?  Not just in the things around you; you know the common scene that I'm talking about:

You have a key that fell out of your hands in the dark right in front of you and even with your cell phone flashlight you can't even locate it and you think Why can't I win? and then when you get up the next morning to look for it it's under the driver seat because it was as you were getting out of your car that you dropped the key and it actually bounced off the hard plastic interior of your door and ricocheted back inside your car rendering your 10 minute search in the patch of grass you stopped by outside your car the night before totally and completely moot.

Yeah that happened to me, too; or at least a friend of mine.  Yeah, a friend of mine.  Mason.  Yeah, Mason.

But what did most definitely *cough* happen to me is I carried that lie of a question around with me for the past couple of months.  And it had nothing to do with anything going on outside of me.  It was all within.  Every bit of it.

What's crazy is that I didn't consciously choose this to happen.  It was able to happen all by itself.  Your fear and doubt, I've learned, can win the battle in your mind so fast that it's usually finished it's bloody work before you have a chance to even realize that it's begun.

There are so many things that happened in so many areas of my life in the past couple months that taught me the same lesson.  But the best example that epitomizes the whole picture is in something that happened at work.  Wow.  A lot seems to happen at work, doesn't it?  I realized this today as I was driving around town:  Everybody has different tastes and preferences on everything.  Everything!  But eventually, everybody goes to Wal-Mart no matter what.  Everybody.  Try this sometime.  Pick a store that you go to that no one else you know goes to.  Then next chance you get ask a friend if they've ever gone there.  If they say no, then ask them if they've ever been to Wal Mart.  Then feel free to report your findings.  I may need a chuckle at that moment.  You never know.

Okay, sorry, sorry, gotta stay focused on the topic at hand.

At work I tried to sell an account one day and as per yoozh--(that's my way of spelling the phrase "as per usual" when I'm only using the first two letters of the word "usual"...if you have a better spelling, again, I'm a holla-back guy, so...just dial)...ack! focus, focus--I got a "no."  Here's the butt-kicker:  I hear "no" ALL...the TIME.  All day every day, it's what I hear.  But for God-knows-what reason, this one killed me.  Like I got sick from it.  Physically sick to my stomach from this one "no."  It's amazing because I can so easily pick myself up and place myself back to that day and tell you everything I noticed.  I remember noting everyone else opening accounts and not me.  I was focused on what everyone else was doing, the success they were having.  I remember the individual that told me "no," actually said it in these words, "I'll come back soon," but unfortunately what I heard was the voice in my head over those words.  You wanna know what that voice said?  Yeah, yeah, they always say that.  And finally, I remember my boss's valiant effort to encourage me to smile as I was leaving to make just one more round in the store.  And my inability to respond in kind.

As weeks passed I began to let go of a lot of junk that had been accumulating for awhile; I know earlier I'd mentioned that so many areas of my life had been attacked by the lie I just can't win and I was beginning to experience the effects of honestly and truly letting go of the burden that just simply is not meant for me to carry.  And I began to experience joy again.  And I began to experience peace again.  And almost two months after that initial "no" and before I could even prepare myself for this, guess what happened.  Guess.  I'll give you three guesses but you'll only need one.

I was at my station helping our line of amazing customers and I look up and what do my eyes behold?: The account.  From two months ago.  Coming back to ask for me.  Two months later.

One of the things I've learned is that I never know if someone will come back or not.  So there's no reason to make myself sick over it.  Ever.