This week my oldest, Mallory, started kindergarten. It was traumatic, but probably not as bad as it would have been if this was 1968 instead of 2008. The fact that Mallory has been in day care since she was 6 months old and was transitioning to kindergarten with a number of her friends from Ms. Pam's 4 year old class made things easier for her. Ya she was nervous, ya she had a new teacher, and ya she had uniforms, but other than that she was excited. This had me thinking of her future and the start of her "real" school and how quickly this past five years has flown by. It also had me thinking of where she was when I started the firm.
Mallory was about 9 months old when I decided to start my practice. Yeah, that's right NINE MONTHS!!! (By the way, what was I thinking!!!)
Anyway, I often meet with other business owners and one of the things I enjoy more than anything is listening to their stories of why they decided to take that leap. Some are continuing a family legacy, some were technically trained to be something and a business appeared around it (like a chiropractor or electrician), and some just had that "itch" to do something different than the normal 9 to 5.
The development of my firm and the path Mallory has taken are an eerie parallel. We each have seen our fair share of ups and downs. Crashes, bike wrecks, hirings, firings, software glitches, forgotten lunches, new clients, lost clients, new friends, new sister, new brother, old friends, teamwork, wins, and losses. Yet, all of these have made us ready for "our" kindergarten.
The decisions, successes, and failures of one's life or one firm's life have made each of us what we are today. My firm has seen exceptional growth just like Mallory has. We have made poor choices (the politically correct way of saying of misbehaving), and have earned our fair share of "ice cream".
So even though we have seen success in our five years, we still have our new backpacks and lunch boxes and are ready to learn. So as we go into Kindergarten we still have that excited feeling, still yearn to learn more about ourselves, and still look forward to more successes.
Oh, and by the way....when is P.E.?
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