Leave Room for Milk and Sugar
Being from Rhode Island I am a fan of Coffee Milk. If you’ve never had it, it’s milk with coffee syrup in it and it’s delicious. Since I grew up on that lovely sweetness, I like to have my coffee the same way. The other day when I was at the coffee shop ordering, the cashier moved over to the coffee maker and looked up and said:
“Do you want me to leave room for milk and sugar?”
I of course said yes and he left a good amount of space. I got to the counter and poured a little more out and was able to add the amount of milk and sugar that made sense for me. As I sat down with my coffee I started to think about the idea of growth in a business and growth in terms of notoriety and even money. The more I thought about my own journey, the more I started to realize how important it is to leave room for the good stuff. The way I see it, if I book myself back to back and say yes to everything that comes my way, eventually I am going to be like a cup of coffee filled to the brim. In order to add milk or sugar, I’d have to dump some of it out.
I used to get really worried about this because I thought that if I turned down a job I might not have another one come along. I also used to worry that if I waited too long to meet someone that I would be missing out on an opportunity.
I eventually came to realize that when I turned down something that wasn’t right for me, it freed me up to have the time to find something that was right for me.
When I held off on a meeting it gave me time to truly prepare for that meeting and do my research. Also, the person who asked for the meeting didn’t mind at all that it took a little while to meet with me.
I was saving room for milk and sugar in my life.
I’ve been fortunate enough to have some really wonderful opportunities come my way and get to know some incredible people. Many of these people could certainly help me with my projects but, more importantly, they could help someone I know and care about with their projects. I may do an interview or a podcast, but once it’s finished I’m not going to be on the show again for a while so I always ask myself who else would benefit from having that interview experience. I then will often suggest them. I wrote a little while back about turning coincidences into gifts and when you give gifts you aren’t pouring coffee into the trash can, you’re pouring it into someone else’s cup. Then you both have a cup of coffee with plenty of room for milk and sugar.
So take some time today to reflect on your own cup of coffee.
How full is it?
Is there room for milk and sugar?
How will YOU make room?
Find someone in your life with an empty cup and pour them some coffee.
Do it and you’ll see how sweet things can get.
Excelsior!
