The definition of perseverance, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary is "continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties, failure, or opposition". We all know what this means. We have all persevered in one way or another. Everyone has struggles. The image on this post says "Fall seven times, stand up eight". It means that no matter how many times you fall, you just need to keep getting back up. Everyone single person has failed at something, and if you haven't you are lying to yourself. Babies fail at rolling over, they fail at crawling, they fail at walking, but they keep trying. The keep-trying mentality leaves some people as they get older and that is unfortunate.
I usually talk about work in these blog posts, but it is usually my day job as a director of loyalty engineering. In this post, I will talk about my other job as an adjunct professor at a local community college, but the post is less about the job and more about the people, well one person in particular. I only teach one or two classes a semester. Due to my day job, I can only teach evening classes. For the past year or two, I have seen the same custodian every day I am on campus. It started with us just saying a friendly hello when we passed each other, but this semester we began talking. We usually talk for about 30 minutes before my class begins. I found out that he is a student at the college in the graphic design program. He is graduating in just a couple of weeks. Our first conversation began because he passed by my classroom one evening and heard me discussing game design. The building I am in houses both business and computer science courses. He assumed I was teaching business. I find that kind of surprising since I dress like I am 12 years old. I wear jeans and various video game T-shirts to class. On more than one occasion I have had people confuse me with a student. An older student, but a student nonetheless. He is a gamer so he decided to strike up a conversation. We talked about video games, but the conversations slowly transitioned away from video games and more toward life. A question he asks me almost every week during these conversations is "Is this real?". What he means by that is that is it possible to get a degree and get a good job. My answer, obviously, is yes. I got a degree and got a good job. I told him that not everyone needs a degree to get a good job, or any job, in software development, graphic design, or any other field. I also told him that some people absolutely need to get a degree. I am one of those people. He understood what I was saying even though I probably explained terribly. He is very excited to graduate soon and to get a job in graphic design. He wants to get a job in the video game industry, but I told him that it is a smaller industry and he may not want to limit himself to just the video game industry to start with. I told him to get his foot in the door. Take the boring job, if you need to. Get the experience. The first job out of school is usually you trying to find a company to hire you, but once you get the experience and the companies may come looking for you. You are probably asking what any of this has to do with perseverance. Don't worry, I am getting to that.
Tonight's class was the 15th or 16th of the semester and remember I said I speak with him for an average of 30 minutes each class. That means we have had between 7 and 8 hours of conversations this semester. I have found out a lot about him and he has found out a lot about me. He asked if it would be possible to go from a custodian job to a graphic design job. I told him of course that is possible. He seems skeptical so I gave him a little of my background. I told him that I had been working since the age of 15. I worked at a small ice cream shop. I worked at McDonald's, Burger King, and Taco Bell, or as I called it, the big three of fast food. I told him about the midnight shift at 7-Eleven followed up by the day shift at McD's. I told him I was a milkman at my last job. This is when I saw him light up. I could see he was thinking "This guy went from a milkman to his very next job being as a software developer". Some things happened in between that, such as getting injured on the job, needing to have multiple back surgeries, being put on social security disability, and then going back to school, but I did go from milkman to software engineer. Not sure if he thought I went straight from high school to college like many people do, not that it matters. When I was on disability and decided to go to school I told a close family member. This family member told me that I was probably reaching a little too far and that maybe I should just try for a certificate of some sort or just live the rest of my life on disability. I used this as motivation. I persevered through working low-paying, physically demanding jobs, getting injured, and going to school later in life, but this is not my story, this is his.
Recently I have found out more about him. He grew up in a rough neighborhood. He was staying with a family member when he first started college and the family member had some not-so-good people that would come around. He kept his head down and kept working hard. He decided that he could not be around the people he was forced to be around so he left that family member's house. He had nowhere to go. He lived on campus, and I do not mean in the dorms (the college does not have dorms). He slept on a bench on the balcony. This was before he got the custodian job. Now his living situation is a little better. He said he lives in a motel now. He said after paying for the hotel he has about $30 left from his check. He walks to class and to work and walks back home every single day. Today he told me that I was doing good in the world by teaching. I told him I am not doing good in the world, I am just teaching because I enjoy helping others. I told him he is doing good in the world because he is showing people that no matter how you grew up or what has happened to you that if you keep getting up after getting knocked down you can overcome adversity. You can persevere.
Do not worry if you get knocked down or you fail at something. The key is to get back up again and keep fighting. He asked if things get easier and I told him that, yes, things can get easier, but never stop fighting. Do not get complacent. Always strive to be better. I told him companies would rather have someone who is hardworking and decent at what they do than have someone who is brilliant at what they do but are lazy. This is not me saying he is not a good graphic designer. I have seen some of his work and it is good. I explained to him what I meant by it. I meant that companies understand that new grads are not going to be great right away. They need to keep learning. Some will be great right away, others will take time to get there. If you are great right out of college, but stop learning and growing you will never get better. If you are decent out of college, but are hardworking and continue to learn and grow you will pass by the "great" person.
I have given him my email address and told him to email me after the semester and we can continue to chat, whether in-person, on the phone, or over the Internet. I am going to tell him to get on LinkedIn, find me on LinkedIn, get his digital portfolio ready, and I will try to see if any of my connections have any entry-level graphic design positions open. I do not have a big reach on LinkedIn, but if he posts that he is looking for a job, and I share it with my connections, and some of my connections share it as well it can reach far and wide. He has what companies should be looking for and that is the right attitude and a hardworking mentality.