My Story. Your Story. Our Story

Opportunities are always found along the way just as frequently as obstacles and problems. Some think I say that just because I have read it in books. Not so.  Results from experience speak more than a thousand words.  Books confirm what I have learned from my life experience. The confirmation excites me because it tells me I am on the right track! And if the written word contradicts I know that either I’m on the wrong side of experience or the book is off track, based in theory and not practice. There is more of the latter than the former.

I confess. I missed a mountain of opportunities over the years. Wow. If I only knew then what I know now!  But it doesn’t matter because I still can learn and adjust and latch onto the opportunities I come across today.

One day I want to tell you my personal story. Perhaps then you will understand why I think the way I do and why I see opportunities where others see mountains of formidable difficulties and challenges. You have never heard my story.  I know you would better grasp some of my idiosyncrasies and why I talk the way I do.  Yes, you would know me in a very different light. And in the sharing of course, I would get to know you in a brighter light!  I hunger for that.

I have a friend here who owns several music stores.  He sells all kinds of musical instruments from guitars, drums and every band instrument you can think of.  He has the ‘classical’ instruments too.  I never knew that his true love is repairing fine, antique musical instruments.  Instruments like violins, cellos, bass and the like.  He currently restricts his practice to repairing instruments for collectors and antique dealers.  He is a dedicated Artist.  This is his Calling in life.

He plans to shortly open his repair to the public. He hasn’t done so previously because collectors will gladly wait.  The public wants and need their repairs ‘now’ as they are using the instruments.  Management of the Music stores, not his true love eat up a lot of his time. But not for much longer.

I found all this out by chance.  I had taken my violin to him for new strings.  He brought me into his workshop and the rest was history!  It was beautiful to see antique instruments in pieces finding their life again. Others would have given these instruments up ‘for dead’.  But of course, he knows what they can do and will do when they come back to life. He even told me the history of my violin. Its origins. Its mercantile purpose. Almost how it came to be in my hands.  He is quietly looking for people to work with him in this craft.  What an opportunity for someone who may want to share in the love of this craft from the ground up! Is this not an opportunity for someone who shares the same love for instruments?

Life is filled with all kinds of circumstances that are setbacks and simultaneously extend the seed of opportunity.  If you ever get to a point in life where you feel like quitting because you are overcome by setbacks try keeping this in mind.  If what you are currently doing doesn’t work for you it probably means that you weren’t meant to do just that.  Don’t allow yourself to be crushed by it. Be thankful that you have learned ‘that’ much so you can go and focus on something that will get what you need to get out of life. This is one reason I love to associate with Business owners.  There isn’t a business owner in the world who doesn’t have setbacks in multiples areas on multiple occasions. They wouldn’t be in business if setbacks dictated their reaction to their craft.  They have to find the opportunity in the midst of their circumstances. Get close enough to the best ones and they will teach you how to read the setbacks as opportunities or messages of a ‘cease and desist’ order, if you know what I mean.  It seems that we would all benefit from a similar approach to the setbacks in our own lives. Learn how to read the  messages and focus on where the light ahead of you shines. Not the darkness.

The often ‘chance meetings’ I make during a week that lead to new associations and friendships often appear as happenstance or serendipitous.  They may be that at the moment. But I believe there is a Divine will at work providing opportunities for me to meet people and learn new ways at looking at old things to get where I need to go. Looking back on life I cannot believe that it just happened by chance.  No. I have beautiful children. Beautiful wife. Wonderful associations and experiences over many years. Not all the experiences were positive nor efficacious. Probably my own fault that they didn’t all turn out the way anticipated.  But they all brought me where I am today. I don’t regret where I am today.  I couldn’t be here without all those experiences. I thank God for that.

I know this is happening to you too. It happens to everyone.  Only those with a heart for life sense that something needs to change.  The first step to resolution is somewhere in the realm of ‘stop’, ‘look’ and ‘listen’. Someone is talking to you and showing the way. That someone is Divine.  Just know it!