I was thinking about this early this morning as I looked over my calendar for the day and saw my 1:00 p.m. appointment to help a woman I know do business cards. Not the first thing I feel like doing to be honest...it is a busy day as it is, but I am so impressed and inspired by this woman that I can't help but be a little excited to spend time doing it. So let me back up. This woman use to nanny for a very good friend of mine. She is originally from Africa and came her to the U.S. without her children under asylum (leaving three children with their father for 3 years) and later (after much work) being able to bring them over here with proper visas. She is a facinating person, who speaks fluent English and French, was a headmistress for a school in Africa, and is constantly looking for new opportunities to better her life here for her and her children. During the past 2 years I've seen her relatively consistently (my friend use to live next door to me) and my kids and their kids play constantly. She recently decided to move on from nannying and become a teacher at a French preschool and during her last day on the job we did a playdate between the children--I happen to be off work that day and met the children at the park with her. Here we sat and chatted and she told me of all her "extra-job" efforts...she sells organic cleaning products, she tutors in French, and she organizes closets. She is very enthusiastic about everything and during the conversation she mentioned wanting to do business cards. Since I didn't think she had access to a computer or graphics programs I offered to help her design one and load it to a site that printed cards.
NOW..finally, the point of my entire post....she called me about a week later and set up a time to come and get help doing her business cards. I think most people would have been too prideful, or figured my offer wasn't genuine, or simply been embarassed. I was impressed she called, and thought a lot about it because this is something that most people aren't good at, but successful people are. Asking for help. Pretty simple really, but most people don't do it. Asking for help or simply accepting it when it is offered is such a key part of being successful because if you don't acknowledge what you need help doing and actually seek to get the help then you can't move forward toward the goal. Signed, ME {lv}
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