By: Edward Ball
It’s been almost twenty years since I have gotten on an airplane, however I remember the instructions so eloquently recited over the intercom by the flight attendants. In case of an emergency the adults were instructed to put on the mask that would drop from overhead. They were to do this before they helped anyone else. Now as a child I thought to myself, my momma better put my mask on before she puts hers on. I was naive, at that time and long into the future, regarding the airline’s thinking behind telling my momma to help herself before she helps her first born.
I have come to realize that the airline had it right, you must help yourself before you can effectively help others. If you are void of resources, like oxygen, you cannot help anyone including yourself; nevertheless, helping yourself first is harder done than said.
It is a new year, 2015, and I am imploring my readers to practice what the airlines preach and help yourself before you attempt to help others. If you are broke, struggling and not where you need to be in your career or life you can’t give others the qualitative and quantitative help you could if you helped yourself get out of being broke, struggling and left behind.
After I left prison and found a job I would come across people I have met along my journey and some of them would ask me to help them get a job where I was employed. I had to refuse. I was still attempting to get my foot in the door so I had to focus on helping myself move up in the company. There was no guarantee I would have been able to help them out in the first place. Fast forward two years now I have the position to hire and fire. I can hire more people in my current position than anyone I have held previously. I knew better than to put my name, reputation, and judgment on the backs of those hoping I could help them get a job.
I did as the airline preached and put my oxygen mask on first and have helped several people put their masks on as well…how that has been working is an entirely different story.
As you move into the New Year get your ish together first before you start playing captain save’em or you and the person you are trying to help will be seeking assistance elsewhere.