time invested

I’ve spent years investing in friendships, people, companies, and my own life. It’s been a life of great enjoyment. The difficult times I’ve walked through with friends, family, companies, even my own mind, over the past few years have made me the man I am today. I’ve always looked at these difficult times in my life as opportunities to encourage, change, lead by example, sometimes just having to make plain old hard decisions. This past year has been the most reward and the most difficult. I’ve seen my wife of 26 years recovering from what should have killed her years ago. My boys have turned from being teens that at time made some poor decisions into fine young men. A daughter who has made the jump into college life while still keeping her values true. I’ve been a part of the healing of a broken company while starting up a new company with people I made a commitment to helping. I feel as though my tank is running on empty. I found myself asking the question, have I been investing in the wrong places? I always had a belief that if I could find the weak spot in someone, a company, a relationship, there was something I could work with/on. A friend once told me I was a “master manipulator”. Not true, never true, almost offensive. I’ve always looked at these countless events in my life as building relationships; some might even call it “Leadership.” It’s easy to see the strengths in people, and companies, but its much more difficult to find their true weaknesses. I encourage you do just that, find the weakness. Build, encourage, be the voice of that weakness. Companies as well as people, never want you to know just what that is. It makes you vulnerable. There have been people in my life that have given up on me in my time of need and I never knew why. I tried my best to never do that. I wasn’t always a boy scout, but I can look back on my life and say I’ve tried to make the best decisions given the circumstances I had to work with. This week I’m re-evaluating just what’s important in my life, because I need fuel more then ever.