Preparing for life

“One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation.” This quote from the late tennis great Arthur Ashe is a key to success in business or life in general. What we continuously prepare and practice we become confident in and ultimately achieve success. When I started my business career Prudential had sales brochures that said, “The Future Belongs to Those who Prepare for It.”

Looking back on those days, how true that statement was. The successful people I’ve met through the years, no matter what their calling, seemed always to be ready for the task before them. The preparation idea was reinforced in training meetings by the statement, “Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance.” Once my manager accompanied me on a sales interview and after I butchered the interview badly he offered some sage advice, “adlibs are for amateurs.” Once again the importance of preparation had been illustrated.

Years earlier my 5th grade teacher, Pearl Alexander, had given her classes lessons in preparation for life in at least three areas. First, she taught us the importance of good penmanship. We worked regularly on cursive writing and the importance of neatness in our writing. She would cringe today if she could see my current writing quality, especially when I am hurried. Next, she had an uncanny ability to teach basic mathematical fundamentals. Daily she did math drills with multiplication tables and other concepts. She had each of us exhibit our skills at the blackboard until we were confident and in doing so instilled ability to understand numbers and their relationship to each other. Lastly, and most importantly, she challenged us to look for important concepts learned in our activities. Once we had identified these concepts she had us think about how we might use the ideas learned. These were preparations that would benefit and follow me throughout life. So often in life we aren’t confident or are unsure of our ability to perform a task. Often these feelings come from lack of preparation on our part. In the end we all need to keep in mind the old Boy Scout motto, “Be prepared!”