ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING

ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING

By Francie Baltazar-Schwartz

Jerry was the kind of guy you love to hate. He was always in a good mood
and always had something positive to say. When someone would ask him how
he 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 followed
him around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason the waiters
followed Jerry was because of his attitude. He was a natural motivator.
If an employee was having a bad day, Jerry was there telling the
employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up to Jerry
and asked him, "I don't get it! You can't be a positive person all of
the time. How do you do it?"

Jerry replied, "Each morning I wake up and say to myself, 'Jerry, you
have two choices today. You can choose to be in a good mood or you can
choose to be in a bad mood.' I choose to be in a good mood. Each time
something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim or I can choose to
learn from it. I choose to learn from it. Every time someone comes to me
complaining, I can choose to accept their complaining or I can point out
the positive side 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 way
all the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to
situations. You choose how people will affect your mood. You choose to
be in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's your choice how you
live life."

I reflected on what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left the restaurant
industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought
about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that Jerry did something you are never
supposed to do in a restaurant business: he left the back door open one
morning and was held up at gunpoint by three armed robbers. While trying
to open the safe, his hand, shaking from nervousness, slipped off the
combination. The robbers panicked and shot him. Luckily, Jerry was found
relatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma center.

After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, Jerry was
released from the hospital with fragments of the bullets still in his
body.

I saw Jerry about six months after the accident. When I asked him how he
was, he replied, "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 his
mind as the robbery took place. "The first thing that went through my
mind 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 could
choose to live, or I could choose to die. I chose to live."

"Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?" I asked.

Jerry continued, "The paramedics were great. They kept telling me I was
going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the emergency room and I
saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really
scared. 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," said
Jerry. "She asked if I was allergic to anything. 'Yes,' I replied. The
doctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took a
deep breathe and yelled, 'Bullets!' Over their laughter, I told them. 'I
am 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 his
amazing attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice
to live fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.