The cost of Entrepreneurial-ship

Business launch
There's a whirl of thoughts going through my mind as I type this post. When I recently attended a Columbia Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting I thought it was just that...a ribbon cutting.  Ribbon cuttings are just normal events, right?   But it was more than I expected.

This ribbon cutting featured the lovely Caroline Leemis and her new business Caroline Leemis Design.  Make sure you check out her work! On top of this business launch, it was also the first ribbon cutting in the League of Innovators downtown space.

In the space of that new business incubator entrepreneurial-ism had a grand opening, too.

At the ribbon cutting, as I talked with my friends Karen Mickey of The Sensible Group and Heidi Fuhrman with The League of Innovators, another friend, Jan (someone I follow on Twitter) happened to be posting a link about the cost of not recognizing entrepreneurial-ism in our world.

Cost of our ignorance
By the term cost I'm not using a play on words, I'm talking about financial cost here. Furthermore, these costs depend on where you are in this world; numbers differ between Europe and the United States. But over all, we're talking about a loss of millions and millions of dollars for our economy when we fail to recognize and cultivate our talents.

There are estimates that one in three business entrepreneurs are dyslexic. Generally it's recognized that anywhere from 10 to 20 percent of the population is dyslexic, so why the increase when it comes to business?

Two things are happening
First-- a large number of people fail to recognize their own dyslexia. They discount their strengths and weaknesses, and do not recognize the actual reasons they have differences in the way they do things in life.

Secondly -- overall in the business world a large number of people are dyslexic.

So what does this mean? It means we have to be more aware.

In the UK it's estimated that 1 in 5 people in the business world are dyslexic. But the lack of recognition for dyslexia in the UK costs them over $1 billion a year.

Here in the United States the estimate for the number of dyslexic people in the business population is even greater: it's 1 in 3.  So what does that translate to in financial terms for the United States?

Let me know what do you think!

"You'll never amount to anything!" that's what he told me!

Things aren't always what they seem

By the time I was five years old I was planting a small garden behind our house, drawing simple landscape plans and making trips to the local nursery with my dad. No one had any idea that I was a dyslexic learner because of the things that came easily for me. Reading included. 

When it came time to move on to higher education I was confused at why anyone would pursue a degree in something that wasn't hands-on.  Things have changed; I've wised up a bit over the years, but back then a degree in horticulture just made sense to me. 

To get that diploma from Western Illinois University, an agriculture degree with an emphasis in horticulture, I had to complete some work in the Botany school. 

For horticulture exams our professor, Dr. Harold Schmalfeld, would line tables with small pieces of bark, leaves, berries, or written descriptions of tree characteristics and it was our job to identify the genus and species of the plant. 

Botany exams were no different. We were expected to identify a variety of plants but for that final exam we were expected to provide one of our own test questions. 

No problem, I thought! Identification tests are the easiest and we supply one question ourselves. What could be easier!?"

Back in the day

Back in those days the plant Euonymus alatus had not become the pest that it is today so when I found some growing in the wild I thought I had this bring-your-own-test-question thing down pat. I marched in for that final test like a proud peacock strutting my feathers, only to find out that the real excitement was soon to happen. 

I guess it was a few days later when our grades were posted for that final class in our final botany series when I marched in to discover the horrible truth.  I'd missed one question.  

The misdeed occurred, of all places, with my own sample. 

"Impossible! Has to be a huge mistake" I thought as I ventured down to the professor's office. "Should have this cleared up in a matter of minutes!"

Winged Wahoo

Minutes did go by as we discussed everything besides Euonymus alatus.  Why not take a little time to talk to the professor, I rationalized, thinking this was all but a done deal. But when the topic of identifying the plant finally arose all niceties slammed to a halt. 

"That plant is not a burning bush", the professor dug in, his demeanor changing.  "My wife is Hawaiian, in Hawaii that plant is called a winged wahoo."

"But, sir", I interjected, "Here in the mainland we call it a burning bush, wouldn't you agree?"

"No, it's a Winged Wahoo." 

In my mind 'who's the dean of this department' quickly popped up and 'maybe I can get a clear answer out of the dean.'  I said that out loud at one point...seems there was a minute detail I'd neglected to learn. Mr. Professor Winged Wahoo was the class instructor and the dean. 

How lucky for me!  Okay, maybe reading isn't so easy because how in the world did I miss that little detail? 

You'll never amount to anything

Without missing a beat the professor jumped on the chance to map out my life for me--

"You are never going to amount to anything in life," he threw out at me. 

"You'll never own a nice home, have children or amount to anything!" he concluded.  

And there it was, he was labeling me a loser! 

Winged Wahoos of life!

For some reason that experience came to mind this fall weekend when the temperatures outside were summer-like and it was a perfect for a little final yard work of the year.  

I have a new house and with this house I have inherited a few winged wahoos.  It's funny now---I've owned a few houses since then, managed to raise four children and have done a few other things along the way.  There are plenty of things I'd still like to accomplish in this lifetime but I think I can say I've been able to amount to at least something!

But this isn't really about me. What about the kid who hears over and over 'you'll never amount to anything'?  I think there's more for this old dyslexic horticulturalist to do out there in this world!  

"He was mentally slow, unsociable and adrift forever in his foolish dreams."

A Moment to be Thankful
Thankfulness and gratitude is the theme for Thanksgiving.  Besides being a worthy topic, that topic is also along the same line of thinking that I began my year with -- positive thinking.

A great reminder came to me one evening while I was reading. The idea of how our faith supplies us with the simplest of needs struck me as a microscopic idea, simple and extremely meaningful.

Glimmer of Brilliance 
In the middle of my reading a glimmer of the western sky caught my eye.  Through the upper window in my study the crimson color of the sunset pulled my focus to the performance on the horizon right outside my window.  Brilliant gifts continued to spill forward as the earth rotated and maneuvered toward Missouri nighttime. There were more combinations of majestic beauty in those moments than I could have hoped to see in a week of time ... all glittering freely right before me.

The awe inspiring moments reminded me of Albert Einstein's work.  Einstein explained the color of the sky like this:

In the evening the sky turns orange and red.  This happens because the visible light rays are hitting the particles in the air at different angles and at different speeds [than during the day] so the sky color changes from blue, that we see in the daytime hours, to a nice red-orange color. 

Foolish Dreams 

Of course Einstein had some very deep thinking to go along with those simple thoughts written above but, did you know this was said about him, by a teacher, when he was young: 

"He was mentally slow, unsociable and adrift forever in his foolish dreams."

'Adrift forever in foolish dreams' may not sound like a great physicist but his creative ability to imagine was all a part of Einstein's genius. 

As a young boy, Albert began to wonder what a light beam would look like if you could run alongside it, at the speed of light. [These thoughts were inspired by a book someone gave him.]  And from there his theories, such as the Theory of Relativity, sprung. 

I'm thankful for each evening that I have an opportunity to witness the majestic beauty of the sunset, that carries me into the next day with positive thoughts about all I've been blessed with in my life.