10:50AM The Ritz Carlton Boston, MA
As a kid I always had an adventure of some sort going on.
Everyday was like the Goonies or Indiana Jones. Something straight out of an 80’s action thriller.
If me and my homeboys weren’t running across the train trestle by M.I.T. almost dying from getting hit by a freight train we were riding our bikes through “snake path” down by the BB & N private school.
One time I got my heat split open at the River Festival along the Charles River in Cambridge.
Blood gushing everywhere 100 stitches and no lie not one tear.
A bunch of my friends and I were grabbing rocks from an empty lot on one side of Memorial Drive and running across the street to throw them in the Charles River.
We had been doing that for a few minutes going back-and-forth grabbing rocks then throwing them in the river.
In the course of me crossing the street after I had got some rocks I heard a faint ringing noise but it really didn’t alarm me because it wasn’t that loud.
But then it kept getting louder and louder and before I knew it I got pummeled by a bicycle.
This idiot was a Harvard student blazing his 100 pound, ten speed bike doing 25 M.P.H. on a blocked off road with a little toy bell.
You know those ugly little bells you ring with your hand? It barely makes a sound let alone from a far distance.
Now when I fell down to the ground I had a handful of rocks in my left hand. They were decent sized rocks not little pebbles.
I fell on them because the bike hit me from my right side so I fell on the rocks I had in my left hand.
One of those big rocks smacked me right on the left side of my four head and split my head clear open.
Now mind you like I said this was the Annual River Festival on Memorial Drive in Cambridge and the street was blocked to all traffic.
I remember saying “where’d that idiot come from?” I was no older than 9 or 10 but I was ready to get up and beat that dude up for sure.
Smack him with a rock in the head after I ring a little bell letting him know he’s getting ready to get hit in his head with a rock.
I ended up having to get 100 stitches. And I was back to playing little league baseball the next week.
How about the hot summer day I was eating my dinner and out of nowhere I hear a banging on the door.
Bang bang bang!
It was Charles from around the corner or “Boss” if you asked him.
“Yo Mal yo Mal! Gary said he’ll beat you down in a fight”
He was talking about Gary from Lopez street. Whatever.
“Tell him I’ll be there after I eat my dinner” I said, as cool as the popsicle I was gonna enjoy once I finished putting them hands on him.
I was a confident kid because I always had a secret weapon: my heart.
I always knew that most kids that were big tend to think they can intimidate you with their size.
I overcame that with fearlessness. And even though I wasn’t an idiot and I knew I would get my head beat in every now and then, I just couldn’t back down.
It made me tougher no doubt.
Stubbornness is what it really was and it got me into trouble sometimes.
Like the the Dave Chapelle skit “when keeping it real goes wrong”. That was definitely me a few times.
But apply that same stubbornness to your business and amazingly you see results.
The stubbornness to constantly work on improving your company and astonishing your clients.
The stubbornness to get up early and stay up late working on improving your business and implementing procedures and policies to increase the money you put in your pocket.
Sometimes the qualities we have maybe looked at as being negative but if we are able to turn those negative qualities into something positive we can actually get some results in life and in business.