On Tuesday I packed my bags (actually, I never really unpacked them) and hopped on the same flights back to New York City… yes, it felt like total deja vu the entire time (which made me think of Beyonce’s song) and as I landed at La Guardia, hailed a cab, and sat in the taxi, but this time alone, I had a giant revelation…
Well, it wasn’t exactly IN the taxi cab, it was after my cab driver yelled into his phone to someone and when he pulled over at Grand Central Station and told me he couldn’t take me all the way to my hotel but that it was a “simple” subway ride… I just had to get on the “1” and it would get me to where I was going. Did he know I was a Midwest girl that lives in a town of 12,000 people (and one taxi cab?) No, no he did not. The subway is anything but simple to a small town girl…
As I shook my head and pulled my classic JK “fake it ’til you make it” attitude, I stood on the curb with my luggage in hand and wondered what the heck just happened. I walked in Grand Central and for a solid ten minutes I stood there just marveling over how incredible/busy/beautiful it was… but also how insanely lost I was (without a plan to get to my hotel.)
The way I saw it, I had a few options…
1.) Ask for help: find someone who looked kind enough to help me out.
2.) Get in the 20-deep cab line in front of Grand Central and find a new driver.
3.) Figure it out (like I always do.)
Well, if you haven’t guessed it yet, I chose option 3. I found a kind New Yorker who pointed me in the right direction (though I couldn’t keep those directions straight.) I was tempted to just hop into the cab line but saw it was long and slow and that fueled my desire to “figure it out.” As I crossed the street, hauled my suitcase down the subway stairs, bought my ticket, and promised I would figure it out, I realized this whole experience was a LOT like running a business.
I asked a kind person (who told me to go the opposite direction I was headed, thank you stranger!) and then another and finally I got onto the right subway where I sat next to a group of women who were speaking a different language and staring at me… I panicked for a solid ten minutes that I was going the wrong direction, pulled out the map I was given last week in NY (like a total tourist) and knew that this small town Wisconsin girl could figure it out…
Why this is like life as an entrepreneur:
- Most of the time our destination changes. What we imagine and where we end up usually are two very different places. No one is right or wrong, but if we are so fixed on where we are headed, we might miss the other options in front of us.
- You learn that there are people you CAN trust and people you can’t really trust – note to self: don’t trust that cab driver but do trust the woman with the kind eyes on the subway (and while this lesson sucks, focus on the good ones out there, because they do exist.)
- There will be times when you want to throw in the towel, times where you’d rather stay still and cry, where you want to just take the easy way out, times when it feels like everyone else has it figured out and you have no clue… keep on going.
- Kindness wins – every time. I smiled at everyone, was polite, complimented people on their cute coat/purse/glasses and made the journey enjoyable. While New Yorkers might rather stare at their phone screens, I would rather smile at faces (not screens!) Always choose kindness.
When I climbed those subway stairs and ended up right in front of my hotel the sense of pride I felt was incomparable. Sure, that original cab driver SHOULD have taken me home – but he didn’t and so I figured it out on my own, went my own way, and that hotel bed never felt sweeter. I had made it, in my own timing and in my own way… a lot like my journey as an entrepreneur.
Don’t give up, even when you’re lost.
You will go your own way, that’s the beauty of it!
