View from the Summit

Relationships are the number one key to success both personally and professionally. Taking the time to invest in long-term relationships have paid the most dividends repetitively of any tactical move I could have performed. I look back over time and see the countless lives I have invested in and come to appreciate even more the value those relationships have afforded me. 

When you take the approach of what you can give 

to the relationship rather than what you can get, it works. 

Twenty yearsago, when I was 35 years old, I never heard mention of a life or business coach. I was under the impression that you just needed to get in the game and figure it out. I read articles, books and news post to gain all the information I could in life and business. It never dawned on me to hire a professional that could walk me through the difficulties or more importantly point me in the right direction. 

Fast forward, it's now 2015, and my experience has taught me that it is necessary to hire an experienced coach in whatever arena I'm interested in tackling. I feel that I am capable of figuring out most problems or new processes alone and possibly even mastering them, but why would I want to travel the road alone, unaided, with no direction at all? Why would I want to invest the time, resources and energy dodging all the land mines and potholes? Why not pay a professional that has walked where you're headed, rather than get all banged up yourself?

I so wish this story were not true, but it is. It was a Wednesday morning around 7:30 AM late 2001, I was on my way to the office. A beautiful morning, hot, but it was still early and the morning air felt nice. I was traveling down a main four lane road that leads directly into Nashville. I was driving on the inside lane, next to the turning lane. Just to my right a Metro bus had stopped in the middle of the road, not at a bus stop, just in the middle of the road. I noticed to my far left a man running across two lanes of oncoming traffic and paused in the turning lane. He was waiting on my lane of traffic to clear so that he might proceed to catch the waiting bus. I slowed momentarily to make certain he was waiting to cross, and then proceeded. This all took place in a couple seconds. I'm sure you understand, when driving we make a lot of calculations in our minds every few seconds. Just as I started to pass him, he took off running to catch the bus, and at that very instant both our lives would forever change.