How To Define Your Value. Making The Juice Worth The Squeeze.

Know how to find a needle in a haystack??Burn it down.?Sounds aggressive.?Becoming that needle, and withstanding the fires revealing your value requires resilience.?Like stormy seas make better captains, your value to your self and others is refined by struggle. ?

Remember, every expert in every endeavor started as a novice.?Experts exit the galvanizing gauntlet better for the experience.?In search of excellence??There’s testing required. Beneath the heals of travelers trekking to see a mighty Sequoia that's withstood 1000 years of wind, rain, fire, earthquakes and freezing are countless wilted flowers.

Bringing your A game means toting your proficiencies to the plate.?Grandmas are beloved because their A game is forged in the tempests of life. ?Star players are admired because their suffering results in pinnacle performances.?Successful business leaders, the ones we like to talk about, have battled the biggest threats to their survival.

Ever wonder if you’re making a difference??The question haunts me frequently. It alights itself when I hang around people without an agenda who seemingly are as happy as anyone else.?While their happy factor may be high, their contribution to the world factor may be low.?They’re having fun, but it’s personal, not exponential.??

Contributions are the slices of life that make the loaf of life whole.?It’s purpose.?Purpose manifests itself as value.?If we’re making contributions with the intended benefit to others our value is magnified.

Dissecting Einstein’s quote, “Try not to become a man of success, but a man of value” suggests success is predicated on value.?And hidden value has none.

My buddy Bill is a sales stallion.?He’s a difference maker wherever he goes.?I’ve had the luxury of working with him in multiple instances where he proved his value every time. ?He opens dealers quickly, sells more than comrades and delivers the goods 100% of the time.?Betting on Bill is a sure thing.?His mastery is like watching a magic show.?It’s mesmerizing. ?

Drop Bill in a foreign country where he doesn’t speak the language and he’d still blow away the local sales force.?How does he do it??He speaks human.?He’s likable, direct, with a perceptive charisma that opens wallets. A true professional, Bill reaps repeated rewards.?He also owns his authenticity and never pretends to be something he’s not.?Buyers gravitate toward Bill’s natural approach to offering opportunities that dealers can’t refuse.

I love the Zenness of, all the darkness in the universe can’t extinguish the light from a single candle.?It’s inspiration toward making a difference.?Lighting that candle becomes the bedrock of aspiration.

Think of individuals who’ve changed the world positively, Steve Jobs, MLK, Jesus, Ghandi, Buddha, Einstein, Mother Teresa, there’s a long list.?They lit their candles, aspiring to challenge the status quo. Tempered on the anvil of life, their dings in the world change lives.

Sometimes a ding is closer to home, unexpected events created by the unsung surrounding us.?Tayeb Souami’s thrifty wife told him to return to ShopRite near their Little Ferry, New Jersey home to exchange the $5 orange juice he bought for the $2.50 variety.?He did.?With the $2.50 change he bought 2 lottery tickets.?

New Jersey’s May 29, 2018 Powerball lottery was worth $315M and Souami won it all. ?His wife deserves the credit.?Winning New Jersey’s 8th largest jackpot, the 1996 African immigrant now loves orange juice more than ever.

Everyone in our lives brings certain values. ?Values shared are fortunes multiplied.?Unless those values are contributed they remain worthless. ?

Unless Souami’s wife acted upon her thrifty nature, he’d still be an accountant for a food importer.?Unless Buddha shunned his royal life in exchange for defining the path to enlightenment, over 506M followers, about 7% of the world’s population, would be less enlightened.?Unless Bill shared his sales talents, there would be more anxious sales managers.?

Every competent business manager is looking for that needle in a haystack.?That exemplary performance, that catalyst for change, that innovator creating followers.?How do you leverage your value:

• Increase its worth, revealed by its extent of sharing.?
• Embrace the suffering perfecting your value.?A rock is a rock until it’s polished.
• Harness your unique identify for peak performance.

It’s there, you just have to sharpen and release it.?Share your value to reveal its impact.?If you want to leave your mark on the world, your truth is what the world is waiting for.?