The way of the Offroader...
You're always going to have a choice. You can do things the accepted way. Jump through all the hoops like a good little dog, and maybe just maybe if your face fits, you might be accepted into the inner circles, and you'll get to hold the hoops, while someone else gets to jump through them.
This is something that always surprises me. Since I started working in 1984, I watched some people climb the ladder, some more successfully than others. Some people climbed to the top against all the odds. Then every time something strange happened. Once they were there, they made 100% certain that no one could ever do it in the same way.
I think my resistance to the government taxing us huge amounts isn't the money, it's the fact that in doing so they have made it almost impossible for anyone who doesn't come from money to get up there. I want my son and my grandchildren to have a chance.
Many years ago there was a trainer I worked with. I'll be honest I didn't like him. He was dishonest and that's not something that sits well with me.
We were paid a pittance at the time for our personal training. I think if the club charged us out at £35.00/ hour we received slightly less than £7.00, but we were also expected to hit target month after month. So he chose to steal. Some he would put through the books and get paid for, others he would take cash in hand, and he wasn't subtle either. Probably the worst proponent of this I have ever seen. Then something strange happened, he got promoted straight from the gym floor to the club manager's position.
Now maybe I am being naive but he now had the chance to right a wrong. Did he? Not on your life. He closed all the loopholes (that he'd made lots of money doing). He then changed the system so the club manager took a percentage instead. 'Apparently' it was because of his success, that the trainers did so well.
The story ended well. He had a stroke and while in hospital his DNA was flagged and it turned out he was a major fraudster. Jail time. Ho hum!
If I see something that's wrong, or that doesn't work, I'm not going to repeat it. I am going to change it for the better. A prime example was last summer. We all know the fiasco that surrounded the 'fair' lottery system that was used for the Olympic tickets. Fair?? Who was it fair to? Some people got thousands of pounds worth of tickets they couldn't afford, and then the parents and children of future Olympians didn't even get a sniff of a ticket. Ok the first time round it didn't work and upset lots of people, so change it. No they couldn't change it because that would be admitting they got it wrong. Well Seb that part you got it majorly wrong!
So where am I heading with this?
Sometimes you have to play by the rules. You have no choice. You can do what the All Blacks do and play right to the very edge of the rules, and play to the whistle. If you get caught, you understand the consequences of what comes next.
But we live in a new age where the rules in many areas are being redefined. Where a single person can outwit and out match a much larger organization because they are too slow to react and adapt.
I've always found it funny when one organization's number crunchers go up against another's creatives. By the very definition creatives are going to go out and create, make life hard, they will create a way to get round it. Take away their resources and they will out innovate you, because they don't see anything as a given or beyond their scope. They will use whatever is at hand to beat you or improve things.
SO what do you want? You have a choice go the way of the treadmill, endless running and getting nowhere.
Or you can choose to create, innovate, duck, dive and work out how to get what you want. On your terms, not someone elses.
Go for the impossible. If you want to write a book, set yourself a weekend, and write it. Is that even possible? Imagine someone has your family, they are going to shoot them. You have from Friday night till Monday morning to produce a miracle.
I bet you could do it.
There is probably nothing on the planet we couldn't achieve with the right motivation.
I'm still looking back at that road filled with people. I'm off the path cutting cross country, messy, slightly broken, scarred, but I've endured and every day brings me closer to my own mountain peak.
What's your dream? Get off that treadmill and make for your mountains, live the Offroader life...
Make the impossible a reality.
This is something that always surprises me. Since I started working in 1984, I watched some people climb the ladder, some more successfully than others. Some people climbed to the top against all the odds. Then every time something strange happened. Once they were there, they made 100% certain that no one could ever do it in the same way.
I think my resistance to the government taxing us huge amounts isn't the money, it's the fact that in doing so they have made it almost impossible for anyone who doesn't come from money to get up there. I want my son and my grandchildren to have a chance.
Many years ago there was a trainer I worked with. I'll be honest I didn't like him. He was dishonest and that's not something that sits well with me.
We were paid a pittance at the time for our personal training. I think if the club charged us out at £35.00/ hour we received slightly less than £7.00, but we were also expected to hit target month after month. So he chose to steal. Some he would put through the books and get paid for, others he would take cash in hand, and he wasn't subtle either. Probably the worst proponent of this I have ever seen. Then something strange happened, he got promoted straight from the gym floor to the club manager's position.
Now maybe I am being naive but he now had the chance to right a wrong. Did he? Not on your life. He closed all the loopholes (that he'd made lots of money doing). He then changed the system so the club manager took a percentage instead. 'Apparently' it was because of his success, that the trainers did so well.
The story ended well. He had a stroke and while in hospital his DNA was flagged and it turned out he was a major fraudster. Jail time. Ho hum!
If I see something that's wrong, or that doesn't work, I'm not going to repeat it. I am going to change it for the better. A prime example was last summer. We all know the fiasco that surrounded the 'fair' lottery system that was used for the Olympic tickets. Fair?? Who was it fair to? Some people got thousands of pounds worth of tickets they couldn't afford, and then the parents and children of future Olympians didn't even get a sniff of a ticket. Ok the first time round it didn't work and upset lots of people, so change it. No they couldn't change it because that would be admitting they got it wrong. Well Seb that part you got it majorly wrong!
So where am I heading with this?
Sometimes you have to play by the rules. You have no choice. You can do what the All Blacks do and play right to the very edge of the rules, and play to the whistle. If you get caught, you understand the consequences of what comes next.
But we live in a new age where the rules in many areas are being redefined. Where a single person can outwit and out match a much larger organization because they are too slow to react and adapt.
I've always found it funny when one organization's number crunchers go up against another's creatives. By the very definition creatives are going to go out and create, make life hard, they will create a way to get round it. Take away their resources and they will out innovate you, because they don't see anything as a given or beyond their scope. They will use whatever is at hand to beat you or improve things.
SO what do you want? You have a choice go the way of the treadmill, endless running and getting nowhere.
Or you can choose to create, innovate, duck, dive and work out how to get what you want. On your terms, not someone elses.
Go for the impossible. If you want to write a book, set yourself a weekend, and write it. Is that even possible? Imagine someone has your family, they are going to shoot them. You have from Friday night till Monday morning to produce a miracle.
I bet you could do it.
There is probably nothing on the planet we couldn't achieve with the right motivation.
I'm still looking back at that road filled with people. I'm off the path cutting cross country, messy, slightly broken, scarred, but I've endured and every day brings me closer to my own mountain peak.
What's your dream? Get off that treadmill and make for your mountains, live the Offroader life...
Make the impossible a reality.
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