One of the key lessons I have learned on my journey is the importance of following your heart. Following my heart has made me the man I am today. For example, when I was 18, I had a real estate license but struggled. At that age, I couldn't sell a house or even really show a house, because nobody wants to buy real estate from someone so young.
In any case, at this time there was an Italian restaurant near my house and I used to eat there often. There was a girl who worked at the restaurant who was a little bit older than I was; I was 18 and she was about 20 or 21. Her name was Amy; we would talk a lot because I would hang out there for a couple of hours at a
time. She knew I was struggling as a real estate agent and she told me that she just got a job at a telephone survey place and that they were hiring like crazy, paying top dollar at $12/hr. I followed her there to apply for a job. She ultimately wasn't good at the job, but it turned out that I was. At that place, you really had to be good on the phone. It taught me how to talk to people, to listen to their voice inflections, how to speed up and slow down, and how to manage the inflections of my own voice. This is something that has really affected the way I interact with women. Women love a man who knows how to talk to them and how to whisper those sweet nothings in their ear…
Anyway, Amy eventually went back to the pizzeria. After about a year, I needed some extra money and they were hiring at the pizzeria, so I ended up working for the telephone survey place during the day and the pizzeria at night. I still had a crush on Amy, but she was older and could get into clubs and bars and I was still just 18. I had a car, but all of her boyfriends were from the wealthier side of town and drove Corvettes, Camaros, Monte Carlos, etc. while my car was a Japanese 2 door used. But still, Amy and I talked a lot and it ended up that I got a job as a dishwasher at the restaurant. The place wasn't that busy and as the dishwasher, I could spend hours talking to her. There would be times when it was busy in the front and I’d be in the back washing dishes and have nothing to do, and the 2 Italian cooks in the back would teach me how to cook. So at the Italian restaurant, I gained another life skill; not only was I learning to talk to people – but the restaurant cooks taught me how to cook meatballs, lasagna dishes, etc. I don’t think there’s a woman in the world who doesn't think it’s really sexy when a man knows how to cook. Because I followed my heart with Amy, I gained that impressive skill.
I wasn't making quite enough money between the two jobs and as I got older, I started building my IT career. When I was younger I was always good at computer games etc., and at one point somebody taught me how to hack phone cards. I did it in a friendly way; I never stole any money or anything like that, but one
day the FBI showed up in my living room with my computer sitting on the floor unplugged and taped up. This was back in high school, and at that time the laws were different; you were able to break into company websites and look around and snoop, but the laws today are much stricter. You’re not even allowed to break in. Anyway, I didn't get into trouble; they just wanted to talk to me, but at that time, the FBI guy told me something very important. He asked me “Why don’t I use my skills to help companies close up their loopholes, rather than sneaking through them?” His words made a huge impact on me, and I remembered that incident when I was working in the kitchen at the Italian restaurant. As I was getting closer to the age of 21, I had some skills under my belt, and so I decided to pursue an IT career. Initially, I applied to the ARMY ROTC program, but through their testing, even though I was extremely smart and skilled, they wanted me as a front line soldier. I asked why, and they had said I had a rare eye blindness, that I can see through camouflage. This was due to the fact that I had stared at the sun a bit when I was younger, which caused the color blindness, burned my color filters, and actually had raised all my other senses. I decided to pass being a front line soldier, and went into the private sector becoming the owner of a very successful IT company for about 10 years. But I think today, had I not burned my filters, would I be dead? As a few months after that ROTC recruit, the US had gone to war in the Middle East. And those raised senses help me in so many ways today.
How does this tie into following your heart? Well, back in high school, when I was learning computers, I had a crush on a girl in my freshman year. She took a typing class, so I took the same typing class, just to follow her, just like I followed Amy later on. I was one of only 3 guys in the classroom. Our typing teacher liked me and he pushed me which really helped because I excelled at that class and I got up to 60 or 70 words per minute. The teacher recommended that I take a second year.
It turned out that the girl I had followed was sleeping with the whole football team and that kind of turned me off. But in the class there was another girl, who was kind of shy and very pretty. We took the second year of typing class together and bonded for a long time. In that second year, I got up to about 85 words per minute but it was very embarrassing because I was the only guy in the class, and there were about 6 girls, all of whom are secretaries or paralegals today. There really wasn't any need for me to take a second year of typing. However, reflecting back now, if I hadn't taken that second year of typing, I wouldn't have aced all my papers in my last year of high school and in college, and I wouldn't be able to type as fast I can when I blog as I do today or email, multitask, etc. In my IT career later on, I definitely needed to have those fast typing skills for typing code, etc.
Following my heart gave me those essential typing skills, just as it gave me the skills to cook and to talk to people. Looking back, I think, “Damn! If I didn't follow the girls I had crushes on way back when, I never would have learned how to cook, or how to talk, or how to type.”
I also followed my heart as far as computers go. My parents were pushing me to be an engineer or a lawyer, but I didn't want to be either of those. I loved computers and technology and still do today. This has been a key part of my success in business, as I am my own IT department in many of my ventures, and allows me to care for my subs and the women in my life.
So things really do happen for a reason, if you follow your heart, even though it may not become apparent at the time.
Coming back around full circle, I ran into Amy, the girl I had a crush on in high school, when I was about 27 and she was 30, and I was now very successful in my IT career. This was before I got married; we were in a famous club in town and she was with her sister. Her sister had a crush on me but was a total bitch; in the ten 10 years that I had known them, she hadn't changed one bit from being a bitch. Amy, however, was awesome; she was a total sweetheart. We had kept in touch sporadically throughout those years; from the time I knew her at the pizzeria when I had my real estate license all the way through my IT career. I always stopped by and said hello. At 27, she knew that I had dated a few people already and I was moving on. At the time, I had a girlfriend that I was pretty serious with. I kind of regret it now, because that girlfriend ended up dumping me on my 28th birthday. I didn't know that at the time, though, and that day in the club, Amy pulled me aside and asked me, “Why have you never asked me out? We get along so well!”
I felt like I flashed back to high school; I remember thinking, “Damn, what do I do now; all those female friends that had signed my yearbook, asking the same question.” Little did they know how submissive I was due to the prejudices that existed in town, mainly from the adults. So I simply told her that I was with somebody at the time. Sadly, I knew that the person I was with wasn't with me in her heart. I should have dumped her and told Amy, “You know, you’re right. What are you doing for dinner next Friday?”, or something along those lines. That would probably have changed my life, but I didn't do that. I was very faithful, and I am still very faithful today with my word, but I learned the lesson. When the opportunity is there, go with your heart and follow your heart. You might not even realize until much later what the importance of that meeting or opportunity was.
How does Jake keep following his heart along his life’s journey? Check in next week in his business ventures that leads to the ultimate turn of events...
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AUTHOR NAME Jake Furie Lapin -- My Blogs
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BOOK "THE SPICE OF LIFE"