How to Save Your Own Life - Hardcover

Gill, Michael Gates

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1592405215 ISBN 13: 9781592405213

Verlag: Gotham Books, 2009

Inhaltsangabe

The brain tumor survivor and author of How Starbucks Saved My Life shares lessons for surviving unanticipated life challenges, from taking leaps of faith and overcoming pride to treating others with respect and minimizing one's reliance on technology. 100,000 first printing.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

The son of New Yorker writer Brendan Gill, Michael Gates Gill was a creative director at J. Walter Thompson Advertising, where he was employed for over twenty-five years. He lives in New York within walking distance of the Starbucks store where he works, and has no plans to retire from what he calls the best job he’s ever had.

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Lesson 1

Listen . . . To Others Who Have Suffered and Survived

“A problem shared is a problem halved.”
—English Proverb

The other day I was standing in line at the checkout counter of a grocery store when a man came up to me, clearly upset and shaking with anxiety.

“I read your book,” he said. “I recognize you from TV.”

I nodded. It was my local store and he was my neighbor, so I smiled—not just to indicate that I welcomed his presence but also to calm him down.

Not only was he literally shaking, but his hair was wild and uncombed, and he looked like he had not shaved for days. “I need to speak to you,” he said. “I am near the edge. You talked of thinking at one time you were near the end.”

“Yes,” I said as the line inched forward. “How can I help?”

“No one can really help,” he said, twisting his face almost into a snarl. It seemed full of anger—as much against the world as against me.

“What happened?” I stammered, hoping to keep him talking as he hugged the grocery bag he was carrying and looked toward the exit.

He was about to leave. He turned.

I sensed that he was embarrassed even to be there, in a public place, asking for anyone’s help. His instinct when he had recognized me, as a guy who had made it through some hard times, had been powerful, though.

He had reached out to me. I sensed he knew he’d involuntarily cried for help.

But now as he glanced around with red-rimmed eyes, I could tell he was hoping to escape and forget that this encounter had ever happened.

Yet he leaned a little closer to me, as though to confide a secret.

“I worked for years,” he said, “like you. But I had my own business. I built it up myself!”

Here I heard a clear ring of pride in his voice. Compared to me, he had really achieved something. I had only received a high-profile job through my connections. A Skull & Bones friend had offered me a job in the largest advertising agency in the world, and I’d ridden to my corporate life on the back of my birth and legacy and social position.

My neighbor’s tone seemed to imply—which was his right and was also probably accurate—that in my corporate life as a top advertising executive, I had merely been a comfortable passenger on a huge train. Starting a company yourself took pride and courage that merely working for a company did not.

“But recently,” he continued, his voice taking on a kind of complaining, rasping sound, “with these greedy bankers . . .”

He left the sentence incomplete.

The line was moving. I stepped forward. He now followed me.

“I’ve been screwed,” he said. “The business I built over a lifetime is . . .”

He couldn’t bring out the words.

“I’m broke. The business is done.”

Tears actually started into his eyes.

I could sympathize. When I was fired, I stepped out into the street and wept. I knew how frightening it was to feel threatened in your professional life—especially if you defined yourself by that life, as I once had. Having experienced the shocking loss of a job myself, I was able to sympathize with his situation. In the past I might have thought: “It’s your own fault.”

But now I have come to a more humble and true view of the world: Oftentimes life can be like a car accident when you are hit by a drunk driver. It is not your fault; you just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I think it is wise for all of us to remember that injunction: “There but for the grace of God go I.”

So I listened to my new friend with real sympathy—I had, in my own life, been in some measure where he was that day.

“I have a big house up the hill,” he said, gesturing so forcibly that he almost hit a lady trying to get by. He jumped back.

“Sorry, sorry,” he said, truly concerned that he had almost hit her. I could sense that underneath the stress he was a kind man, but at this moment he had reached a point where he was out of control. His life was a mess, his hair was wild, and he couldn’t even seem to control his limbs.

“I am going to lose my house,” he continued.

I stepped out of the line. I guided him to a quiet corner by the produce section.

“What am I going to do?” he did not so much ask me as himself in a kind of anguished mutter under his breath.

“My kids love it here. It’s the only home they’ve known. If I lose my house and we leave here . . .” He saw the future, and it was terrible to him.

“It’s all over for me,” he said too loudly. “And for them,” he stated more sadly and softly. I listened intently, trying to recall the same sensation that I know I had felt many years back; it had been more than ten years since I had lost my job.

He continued. “My son George is eleven and my daughter Alice is just five. They will never forgive me for this.”

“I dedicated my book to my kids,” I said, “for their understanding hearts.”

He stared off into space. He clearly wasn’t listening.

In this moment he didn’t care what I had or had not done. “I’m thinking of ending it all,” he said and seemed to get ready to leave. He was turning away.

“Look,” I said urgently, “I don’t think your kids care if you are broke. They’d like to have their dad around.”

But he was leaving now. I called out in a loud voice at his retreating back, “Don’t you think your kids would miss you?”

I wasn’t going to let him get away.

I remembered at that instant a terrible time in the past when I had done nothing to stop a man who was also shaking with anxiety and clearly on a downward path.

I was working late to prepare for a major Ford presentation. I was in my early thirties and had just been promoted to a position as a creative director. I knew that I was going to be tested and I wanted to be prepared, since Ford liked to do what they called “beating up on the agency.”

I was working hard to make sure I had all the ads done just right when Bob North came into my office.

I knew Bob was in trouble.

He was an account guy. Bob was very intelligent but very shy. He had a hard time expressing his opinions. Ford likes them big and tough and I had seen the Ford client demolish him in meetings. Bob was also—in my eyes—too old for his job. He was forty. His blond hair was turning gray. I thought Bob should be the boss of his own account by now—with a title as vice president and account manager at least—not simply another lowly suit, one of many scrambling to survive on the high-pressure Ford business.

I was surprised to see him late that night in my office. Creative people didn’t spend much time talking to “suits.” It was not a welcome intrusion. I was so busy and so anxious to prepare a good presentation, I didn’t want any interruptions—especially from a suit.

“Mike,” Bob said, “do you have a minute?”

I looked up, tired and stressed. Before me I saw a man who seemed full of anxiety. It felt like a disease I didn’t want to catch. His fear and weakness could be contagious—or at the very least a major distraction—and I still had a lot of work to do.

“Actually, no, I don’t have time,” I said, a comment I today regard as terrible cruelty. “But what’s on your mind?”

Bob took a tentative...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Gotham Books
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2009
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1592405215
• ISBN 13: 9781592405213
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 182
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar