Role Model
Who loves their career? Honestly? I do! I’m in a field where there is opportunity to express my passions. I created my own path and part of it was what a mentor told me early in my career that stuck with me so I decided to pursue it. He told me to never settle on being an expert at one thing. Position yourself to be well-rounded so your career and life choices will expand. Focus on utilizing your strengths and you’ll go farther in life. Of course at the time I was overwhelmed with what he said, as I was focused on learning the ropes of the industry and business. But I kept that advice in my back pocket. Fast forward several years, I discover that same mentor moved on to bigger and better things. Ever have that Aha-Moment? You bet I did. That mentor became my role model and I decided to cash in on that advice.
Role Models – we all have them. We see them every day in marketing campaigns for retail, sports, services, etc. We want to emulate their behavior with the hopes of having the same success as they have. More importantly, however, we all need good role models. They help shape the life we want. I’ve had plenty of role models, and want to highlight a couple of them that helped me over the years.
My husband and I named our son Ryne, after the Chicago Cubs Hall of Famer Ryne Sandberg. I was already a Cubs fan before I met my husband. Up until I was 5 years old, my family and I lived in the heart of Wrigleyville, so I was all for him having the honor of naming our only child. Getting to know Sandberg over the years makes me proud to call him my role model. My family and I personally meet with Sandberg each year at the same signing event in the Chicago area. I’ve observed how well he handles his celebrity status, being very personable and accepts compliments with humility. He remembers us and talks to our son as if he were a friend. There was even a time when we saw him dining at the same nearby restaurant we were in and continued a discussion with our Ryne. Now, many years ago I would have been star-struck, freaking out that I was shaking hands with a wealthy, popular, professional baseball player, and flattered he was interested in what we and our son had to say. But through the years it became natural to us to wave, say hello, and catch up for a few minutes on life events from the past year.
Sandberg authored a book called Second To Home, in which I have read several times. I declared him my role model after the first. Sandberg details his personal and professional experiences, some great and some not so great. I admire his ability to be openly vulnerable, describing his emotions when faced with failures, and the actions he took to redeem himself to eventually succeed. His tenacity, humility and PMA got him through the tough times, and those are behaviors I try to emulate in my life.
Another person I look up to is Michelle Obama. I’m not here to talk about politics. Rather, I’m here to talk about how a woman’s gumption and grace caught my admiration and who I see as a role model. Michelle is hard-working, intelligent, and yes, she gets it. She gets the challenges I face as a woman, wife, mother, and professional. She, too, had openly articulated her successes and struggles, in her book, Becoming. It is one I reference every now and then for inspiration.
Michelle spoke of her challenges balancing a career and family. Her stories mirrored my life, keeping up with a fast-paced career while being everything to everyone. As she articulated, ‘Most of us lived in a state of constant calibration, tweaking one area of life in hopes of bringing more steadiness to another’. Some techniques were successful, some failed. And it was okay to fail and not beat yourself up over it. Michelle had to make difficult decisions for herself that were leaps of faith, and built her own circle of inspiration to become a stronger, more confident woman in her own right. As a woman, wife, mother, and professional, I face similar challenges every day, some taking longer than others to overcome, yet I celebrate the successes I have as a result of sweat, tears, determination and hard work. Michelle’s approach to life is what I want to continue carrying with me as I grow as an individual.
All of us have a story or two to tell on individuals, past or present, that serve and impact our lives as a role model. Having mentors improves us in many ways we can imagine. Who will be your life-long guides in your journey to be the best version of yourself?
-Gail
