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Dear Reader,
Call me strange. I don't mind. Being labeled just a little bit crazy has never bothered me. In fact, I think the nutty side of my personality has helped my career. When you're a little bit nuts and funny to boot, people like to see your name on their schedule for the day. They don't mind spending 30 minutes with you and they'll give you an appointment because they know they're in for a good time.
Everyone has a spontaneous side to their personality and I'm convinced they should let it loose more often. I'm not talking about "throwing caution to the wind," that's too tame of an aphorism to describe it--sounds like taking off your shoes and going barefoot would suffice, but it wouldn't. No, to me spontaneity means periodically I need to do something without weighing the pros and cons ahead of time, even if I might end up looking foolish. Running with the zany side of me always makes other people smile and laugh. And that's okay, because I'm laughing right along with them.
Early in my career, I was all business. The line was drawn in my mind and the fun and spontaneous side of me was kept under wraps. I assumed other people wouldn't take to it. Business is business after all, play on your off hours.
But that all changed one day when I sang the theme song to "Rawhide" with a Fortune 500 executive. He was showing me an in-house promotion and the background music in it reminded me of the theme song from "Rawhide." Remember years ago when Gil Favor was a trail boss on a cattle drive and Rowdy Yates (Clint Eastwood) was his second in command?
Without thinking, I told the executive how every Friday night my parents and I would go to the IGA Store, we'd each pick out our favorite TV dinner, and then we'd go home, heat it up and sit on the floor in front of the black and white and watch "Rawhide." The next thing I knew, I started singing the "Rawhide" theme song, and you know what? The Fortune 500 guy sang along, too. After a couple of verses we both regained our meeting composure and we got back to business.
Yes, every now and then spontaneity kicks in and I lose my mind, but most people don't seem to care. In fact they seem to enjoy me more when I'm not so sure about things.
The other day I was exchanging emails with an author, who's also a friend of mine. I told him that my mind seemed to have left me and I was having a hard time concentrating on serious work. "Perhaps we should talk tomorrow."
The next day when I emailed him, I told him not to worry, my mind had returned. But he immediately replied, "Sorry to hear your mind has returned. You are even MORE fun when you have to go looking for it."
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
http://www.DearReader.com
READ THE CLASSICS: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain, and enter the free Penguin Classic's Drawing. Go to: http://www.supportlibrary.com/nl/path_go.cfm?x=815&site=22
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