Do the Right Thing
If you do not know who Dr. Maya Angelou is I suggest you find your way to a computer and google her. She was a pretty cool chick and not to mention extremely smart. She had a way with words that rival the best rappers and orators. I learn much about her life after her passing. In reading her words I came across a golden nugget I think you should know.
Dr. Angelo wrote, “When you get, give, and when you learn, teach…. Be the rainbow in someone else sky.” See what I mean? Her words are simple, direct yet powerful and exciting. I think this principal is important because it helps us to know that we have a responsibility to mentor other and provide the lessons gain from our success and our failure.
If I haven’t said it before I am a proud uncle of two nephews. One in particular is more like a son. To a large degree he is the motivator for my success and in some form he will always be the benefactor of it as well. As with you, I bombard his ears with stories and anecdote of life. He has a few more years before he becomes a teenage so far now, I’m still Superman and everything I say is bible.
Surely, I’m no apostle but I am an advocate of mentorship so I will tell you something I consistently tell him: Always do, the right thing- in the right way, at the right time and for the right reasons.
I wish I can say I came up with but I didn’t. You see, I have someone who practice Dr. Angelou principle and shared this cool mantra with me on my 21st birthday.
Today may not be your birthday but take it from me, listening and embracing the point of this blog will give you more days of celebration than it will days of crying over regret, missed opportunities, or failed moment.
Young people, I’m not that far removed from where you sit to understand where you are but I also recognize that your generation carries a lot more in your backpacks than mine did. The pressure to perform and danger of being left behind your peers is greater now than ever. You are faced with many challenges: to steal, cheat on test, and be something or someone you are not. Believe it or not, those pressures don’t stop once you’re out of grade school. On every level of your life you will be tested.
In life both professional and business you will be faced with the chance to do wrong, to do the bare minimum, to quit or not try at all. Sometimes fear with be present, because doing the right thing often means doing things alone. Sometimes peer pressure with be heavy, and you may even second guess your ability to perform every now and again but no matter what, channel all of your time, talent and energy todoing the right thing and notfocus on outcomes beyond you control.
