Picture three little kids selling water on the beach. What kind of image does that title evoke? Most likely poverty, misery, dire straits. Some sort of child exploitation at best.
I came across this picture-story on Facebook. It's a friend's friend. This is the story of three siblings aged 4, 6, and 7. Donning identical red t-shirts and lugging a cooler, they have opened their first "company". Their dad is taking pictures as they walk all over the beach offering beach-goers and passers-by bottles of cold water. He takes pictures of them trying (and failing) to make a sale, and then captures the joy and excitement of their first sale after ten rejections. In the picture comment the dad writes, "the first 10 people said no and they learned that the road to 'yes' is paved with a lot of 'no's'. But persistence pays off because they sold $60 worth of water."
Still feeling sorry for them?
Despite the fact that these are American kids whose parents are very well-off, here they are selling bottled water on a crowded public beach and dealing with the best and the worst in people, just like adults do. They're faced with indifference, rejection, perhaps even with scorn. But they learn that none of it is relevant when you finally make the sale and reach your goal. They've also learned the true satisfaction of getting rewarded on the merit of their persistence. That's called an Education.
I really wish that we had lessons like this in school. I don't think anything I learned in business class has ever helped me. I don't even remember anything I learned in business class. I can guarantee that those kids will never forget this one lesson though, and that if they choose to go into business when the time comes, they'll be killers. These are the kinds of lessons we all need to learn growing up, and these are lessons we must teach our kids, especially here in Romania. We have a lot of work to do considering this is a society where it's almost taboo to joke around with sales people. Very backasswards if you ask me. But this is how we change!
Here's a quote that perfectly illustrates the difference between America and Europe (and Romania in particular): “This feeling of embarrassment, this shyness, this bashfulness, if you take that out of the people, then these people will do whatever they want do, and that is the very definition of America: a people who have no shame and therefore they do whatever they want to do.” - Louis Farrakhan
Every day I learn a bit about what it means to be an entrepreneur. I've made more mistakes and probably had more failures than successes thus far, so I need reminders like this. What being a business owner really means -in fact, what being a human who has something to live and to fight for really means -is that it's all just a hustle. It's a long road to yes paved with lots of no's and the only thing to do is to...
I came across this picture-story on Facebook. It's a friend's friend. This is the story of three siblings aged 4, 6, and 7. Donning identical red t-shirts and lugging a cooler, they have opened their first "company". Their dad is taking pictures as they walk all over the beach offering beach-goers and passers-by bottles of cold water. He takes pictures of them trying (and failing) to make a sale, and then captures the joy and excitement of their first sale after ten rejections. In the picture comment the dad writes, "the first 10 people said no and they learned that the road to 'yes' is paved with a lot of 'no's'. But persistence pays off because they sold $60 worth of water."
Still feeling sorry for them?
Despite the fact that these are American kids whose parents are very well-off, here they are selling bottled water on a crowded public beach and dealing with the best and the worst in people, just like adults do. They're faced with indifference, rejection, perhaps even with scorn. But they learn that none of it is relevant when you finally make the sale and reach your goal. They've also learned the true satisfaction of getting rewarded on the merit of their persistence. That's called an Education.
I really wish that we had lessons like this in school. I don't think anything I learned in business class has ever helped me. I don't even remember anything I learned in business class. I can guarantee that those kids will never forget this one lesson though, and that if they choose to go into business when the time comes, they'll be killers. These are the kinds of lessons we all need to learn growing up, and these are lessons we must teach our kids, especially here in Romania. We have a lot of work to do considering this is a society where it's almost taboo to joke around with sales people. Very backasswards if you ask me. But this is how we change!
Here's a quote that perfectly illustrates the difference between America and Europe (and Romania in particular): “This feeling of embarrassment, this shyness, this bashfulness, if you take that out of the people, then these people will do whatever they want do, and that is the very definition of America: a people who have no shame and therefore they do whatever they want to do.” - Louis Farrakhan
Every day I learn a bit about what it means to be an entrepreneur. I've made more mistakes and probably had more failures than successes thus far, so I need reminders like this. What being a business owner really means -in fact, what being a human who has something to live and to fight for really means -is that it's all just a hustle. It's a long road to yes paved with lots of no's and the only thing to do is to...
Nailed straight in the head. You my friend are describing the road to success through lots of hard work. It's hard because one hears all those nos and still finds the strength and has the ambition to move forward. In Romania, hard work would make one "prost". It seems that all of the so called "made" people did it through some sort of "smecherie". So, one needs to learn to be "smecher" and the current mentality associates work with conjuring a new "smecherie" unlike in the rest of the civilized world where successful people do actually solve real problems and learn to do so by first failing a few times.
ReplyDeleteThat's pretty much it Norberth, nobody here ever wants to take risks, even when money's not the issue...then it's a matter of not being a 'fraier' or not doing more than somebody else does or not being a laughingstock (sa nu te faci de ras, bai, prostule!)
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