Persistence vs Stubbornness – Launching a Business #4
I am passionate about today being day #4 of my ‘Launching a Business’ series!
So Close I Can Touch It
When I graduated with my Masters in Fine Art from San Jose State University in 1984 I went about applying for college level teaching jobs. I landed a job right off the bat as a part-time, or adjunct, instructor at Cabrillo College in the town of Aptos on the Monterey Bay of California. That seemed like a good start. I landed other part-time teaching gigs shortly thereafter at Evergreen College and Mission College in the San Jose area. I was on my way, a full time job couldn’t be far off, right?
So Far Off I Can’t
It was far off. It was so far off that 8 years, hundreds and hundreds of applications, many interviews and more than a few finalist positions later I gave up. I switched focus, retrained myself on computers during the 93-94 year instead of applying for teaching jobs. I started applying for computer graphic jobs instead, focusing on getting something in the educational computer game market. It worked and by May of 94 we had moved to Tulsa and I had started a new job creating educational CDroms for children. It was the best job of my life.
Giving Up
I made the decision to give up because I saw that my persistence and passion was becoming stubbornness and ignorance. What I wanted may still have happened, who knows, but in my circumstances of having a family and 3 small children, I could not afford to be stubborn and ignorant any longer. I made the switch and never regretted it.
Self-Awareness
The same need to be self-aware is true when you have your own business. You want to be persistent and passionate. And some may call your persistence stubbornness before you do, and call your passion ignorance before you do. You might succeed in spite of having others say you have gone over the edge in those categories. You don’t need to bow to their opinion. But you should consider it. You should be willing to hear them out, see if they have any valid reasons why they think what they do. Especially consider their opinion if you believe they understand you and always have been on your side.
Honesty
Most importantly though you need to honest with yourself. No matter what anyone else says, you have to be self-aware enough, egoless enough, humble enough, strong enough, to face reality. If you face reality, you can move forward, if you don’t, very likely disappointment or even ruin will follow. You don’t want that.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman
Quote by Anthony J. D’angelo, American author
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