Attitude is Everything...

[Guest guest]

Found this interesting - was not sure if i had shared this earlier. http://www.bluinc.com/free/bullet.htm Attitude is Everything...By Francie Baltazar-SchwartzThis article was found floating around on the InternetJerry was the kind of guy you love to hate. He was always in a good moodand always had something positive to say. When someone would ask him howhe was doing, he would reply, 'If I were any better, I would be twins!'He was a unique manager because he had several waiters who had followedHim around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason the waiters followedJerry was because of his attitude. He was a natural motivator. If anemployee was having a bad day, Jerry was there telling the employee howto look on the positive side of the situation. Seeing this style reallymade me curious, so one day I went up to Jerry and asked him, 'I don'tget it! You can't be a positive person all of the time. How do you doit?' Jerry replied,'Each morning I wake up and say to myself, Jerry, you have two choicestoday. You can choose to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in abad mood.' I choose to be in a good mood. Each time something badhappens, I can choose to be a victim or I can choose to learn from it. Ichoose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, Ican choose to accept their complaining or I can point out the positiveside of life. I choose the positive side of life.''Yeah, right, it's not that easy,' I protested.'Yes it is,' Jerry said. 'Life is all about choices. When you cut awayall the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react tosituations. You choose how people will affect your mood. You choose to bein a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how youlive life.'I reflected on what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left therestaurant industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but oftenthought about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting toit.Several years later, I heard that Jerry did something you are neversupposed to do in a restaurant business: he left the back door open onemorning and was held up at gunpoint by three armed robbers. While tryingto open the safe, his hand, shaking from nervousness, slipped off thecombination. The robbers panicked and shot him. Luckily, Jerry was foundrelatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma center. After 18 hoursof surgery and weeks of intensive care, Jerry was released from thehospital with fragments of the bullets still in his body. I saw Jerryabout six months after the accident. When I asked him how he was, hereplied, 'If I were any better, I'd be twins. Wanna see my scars?'I declined to see his wounds, but did ask him what had gone through hismind as the robbery took place. 'The first thing that went through mymind was that I should have locked the back door,' Jerry replied. 'Then,as I lay on the floor, I remembered that I had two choices: I couldchoose to live, or I could choose to die. I chose to live.'Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?' I asked. Jerrycontinued, 'The paramedics were great. They kept telling me I was goingto be fine. But when they wheeled me into the emergency room and I sawthe expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got reallyscared. In their eyes, I read, 'He's a dead man.' I knew I needed to take action.''What did you do?' I asked.'Well, there was a big, burly nurse shouting questions at me,' saidJerry. 'She asked if I was allergic to anything. 'Yes,' I replied. Thedoctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took adeep breath and yelled, 'Bullets!' Over their laughter, I told them, 'Iam choosing to live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead.'Jerry lived thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of hisamazing attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice tolive fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.Please send the reply to lokeshbhog Skydrive - Get 5GB online space for FREE!. Store and share music, photos and documents online with ease. Try it now!