ADVICE TO GRANDCHILDREN

While fishing with Spencer, my grandson, he asked me a very interesting question.  He asked "Grandpa, what Forrest Gumpisms do you have for me?"  After clarifying that a Forrest Gumpism was a saying like "Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you are going to get.", I gave him a few learnings from my life experiences.  

That was the end of that experience until I recently heard former Governor Mike Huckabee on the Today Show promoting his new book: Dear Chandler, Dear Scarlett".  He made the comment that he felt he had an obligation to his grandchildren to pass on the wisdom he has accumulated over his lifetime.  I reflected on Spencer's question and realized that I agreed with Mike Huckabee.  That is the genesis of this portion of my blog.

In his book, Mike Huckabee says "Like every grandparent, I hope to give even better counsel ("to my grandchildren") than I did with my own kids.  After all, when I was raising them, I was a total neophyte at being a parent and had to learn everything as I went along." I feel likewise, so for better or worse, here is the first installment with my advice ( (i.e., Gumpisms) to my grandchildren and great grandchildren:

1. Choose Your Heroes Carefully- It's important to have heroes who you admire and want to emulate.  They are an important part of the maturation process. But, you need to choose your heroes carefully and not choose an empty-headed athlete, pop star, politician, or movie star as a hero.  Choose people as your hero who have made or make a positive, real difference in your life and the life of others.
   
   I have several heroes to suggest to you:
   
   Your Grandmother- From your grandmother, learn how to cope with adversity. Your grandmother is one of my personal heroes.  In addition to being the love of my life and my "soul mate", she is extremely brave. She has battled metastatic breast cancer for almost 19 years.  During her battle she has endured many debilitating treatments and many disappointments.  Throughout, she has maintained a positive attitude and has never once given up.  These are attributes well worth emulating.
   
   Your Great Aunt Donna- From your Great Aunt Donna Weibel, you would be wise to emulate her work ethic.  Even though she has serious health problems, she has worked 60+ hours per week at two jobs.  You would be very wise to emulate her.
   
   Your Parents- Just like Mike Huckabee's three children, your parents are very different from one another.  But, they have all been successful in their own way.  They are working hard to raise you the best way they know how. Make them your heroes and emulate their best qualities.
   
   Rita Lynch- From Rita Lynch, you can learn the importance of family.  Rita is a friend who has devoted herself tirelessly to her family at a great personal sacrifice. She has been an inspiration to me and is one of my personal heroes. 
   
2. People Are Unique-Treat Them That Way-Every person is a unique set of feelings, knowledge, ambitions, and goals.  It's a difficult skill to learn, but learn to treat each person as an individual, not as a member of a particular group.
   
   When I became the head of the Louisville Office of Meidinger & Associates, I had several administrative assistants reporting directly or in-directly to me.  One of the administrative assistants came to me and said that she wanted to learn more about our business.  I gave her reading material about our business and I encouraged her to take college classes, which she did, ultimately earning a degree in marketing from the University of Louisville. She progressed rapidly within our firm and went on to become Vice President of Marketing for a major firm.
   
   I thought to myself that my personal administrative assistant should emulate the behaviors of the previously mentioned administrative assistant.  So, I gave her reading material to take home at night and I encouraged her to take college courses.  After several months, she came to me and said "Pat, you want more for me than I want for myself."  She went on to say that she wanted to go home at night, forget about work, and enjoy herself. 
   
   I learned a valuable lesson from her.  Don't assume you know what people want for themselves.  Make sure you are helping people achieve their goals, not yours. Treat them as the unique individual that they are.      
   
   
3. Learn The Distinction Between Different And Wrong-Just because a culture, technique, practice, etc. is different than what you perceive to be correct, learn to distinguish as to whether it is wrong or just different.
   
   Meidinger instituted a quality review process of its offices to try to assure uniform quality among the offices.  I was part of a team that went to each of our offices to access the quality of the work of that office. One of my first quality assessment visits was to an office that we had recently acquired.
   
   While conducting that review, one of the actuarial assistants in that office made the comment that I was being too critical of the practices in their office.  She said that I was evaluating their office based on my Meidinger experiences and "Pat, you need to learn the difference between different and wrong". She went on to say that their practices yielded comparable results to the Meidinger way but were just different.
   
   She taught me a valuable lesson.  She taught me to focus more on results and less on process, unless the process was significantly "wrong".  Her advice helped me in later life to better relate to people who thought and acted far differently than me.  
   
4. Don't Fight Too Many Battles Or You Will Lose The War-It's important that if your objective is to win the "war", you should conserve your strength and only fight those "battles" that are truly important. To put this into a easier context to understand, if you have a goal to achieve and there are obstacles to achieving that goal, it is at times best to avoid those obstacles rather than confront them with a direct assault. 
   The Chairman and CEO of Meidinger taught me this lesson.  I would regularly offer my opinion to him on various issues.  After one of my memos, he called me into his office and said "Pat, you are fighting too many battles and losing the war." He said that by fighting so many "battles", I was becoming regarded as a person who couldn't be satisfied.  Instead, I should focus my attention only on those things that were most important and thereby win the "war"--i.e., achieving my desired goal on the things that were most important to me.
    
   
5. Learn The Art Of Compromise-This is a corollary to my prior Gumpism. When you do choose to fight a battle, learn the art of compromise.
   As an example, if you are to have a successful relationship with your spouse, friends, co-workers, and people in general, you have to learn the art of compromise.
   
   
6. Learn How To Lose Gracefully-This is another corollary to avoiding unnecessary battles. Some times, you will find yourself in a battle you don't want to fight or, as frequently happens to me, you didn't see the battle on the horizon. In these cases, you have to learn to lose gracefully.
   These types of battles frequently happen between spouses, other family, and sometimes friends.  If a compromise is not available, you have to learn to lose the battle so you can "live and fight another day".
   
   You will have a lot of battles with your parents over your lifetime over "boundaries". Your parents will set a boundary and you will rebel against that boundary.  If you can't find a compromise (for example, adhering to one boundary if they ease another boundary), lose gracefully and perhaps that will earn you political capital for the next battle you fight.

That's enough "Gumpisms" for today.  More later.