What was your greatest epiphany?

[scrabbler1]

I realized during my childhood that being an outlier is okay. That is, not doing what everyone else does is not only okay, but it may be better than if I did follow the crowd (i.e. retiring early, as in at 45).

Often, it was tough going against the crowd. Peer pressure can be tough to combat sometimes, especially in my teen and college years. But, once I began combatting it, it became easier to do so later on if that pressure increased.

 

[CaptTom]

Self-confidence... It doesn't come to you; you need to proclaim it for yourself.

Ooo, good one! It reminds me of this quote by Shakespeare, paraphrased here by Rush in Limelight:

"All the world's indeed a stage, and we are merely players."

Think about it. In everything you do, you are taking on a role. Student, employee, boss, ditch-digger, spouse, parent, child, investor, driver, teacher, hobbyist, golfer, pedestrian, jogger, whatever.

Self-confidence is just acting. You can do it. You already to it every day. Everyone does. (See also, Billy Joel's The Stranger.)

 

[Retch The Grate]

My one moment that felt like an epiphany was back in the late 90s in NYC, sitting in a pizza parlor near St. Marks Place at 3am, after a night of hanging out with my coworkers, eating a slice of NY style pizza, plain cheese, while reading a book on low budget indie film making. I looked up from the book at the room and said "I really love my life". Felt a wave of happiness/contentment/something, and went back to eating my slice and reading the book. So no great wisdom for other people, just a moment of clarity where I was happy with my life choices.

 

[mf15]

After my recent emergency gut surgery at 1 AM,I realized I was mortal. Tie up
any loose ends,enjoy the family and grandkids as much as possible. Enjoy life,
for it is short.
Oldmike

 

[Koolau]

My one moment that felt like an epiphany was back in the late 90s in NYC, sitting in a pizza parlor near St. Marks Place at 3am, after a night of hanging out with my coworkers, eating a slice of NY style pizza, plain cheese, while reading a book on low budget indie film making. I looked up from the book at the room and said "I really love my life". Felt a wave of happiness/contentment/something, and went back to eating my slice and reading the book. So no great wisdom for other people, just a moment of clarity where I was happy with my life choices.

Thanks, I needed that! After talk of early exits, I need to remember that life can actually be pretty good. Aloha.

 

[CO-guy]

My entire life I was raised to believe that any job that's worth doing is worth doing right. I work to make sure I completely understand project criteria and, as a professional rule, my goal is always to deliver ahead of schedule and exceed expectations.

That approach has led to a great deal of success throughout my life. However, at my current job, being competent has only led to more thankless work. It had become so frustrating that 5 years ago I made a plan to leave. The epiphany that has enabled me to remain sane in my position for the past 5 years (and not overworked) came from a line in the Netflix series G.L.O.W. In an episode the manager provides the following advice to one of the wrestlers:

"Try not giving a f*ck. There’s a lot of power in that."

 

[daylatedollarshort]

However, at my current job, being competent has only led to more thankless work.

I figured that out, too. When I worked for megacorp, I used to almost always get the worst, most behind projects to clean up every year. I actually liked scheduling, budgeting and getting projects on track, but I got pretty burned out with no down time and the constant stream of cleaning up projects someone else started and then mismanaged.

 

[Koolau]

Related to the last couple of posts (but my usual 90 degrees twist): An epiphany was that no matter your level of competence, your commitment to the company, your longevity with the company, your contributions, etc. etc., Megacorp doesn't even notice you're gone.

The only exception I ever saw to this was when they decimated our "home built, in house" IT group. Megacorp had all their "stuff" on high-tech, expensive platforms. Getting service from them (adding a small data storage program, for instance) was a real nightmare. SO, we had some guys upstairs who would build you whatever you wanted on their small systems that were used to run and track plant equipment. Our in-house IT geeks still used Cobol and Fortran - instead of the Corp model which was to buy software and make it work for the application. So, since we couldn't get Corp IT to give us a simple data storage system for a bunch of our (very esoteric) lab data, our local IT guys did it for us. Once our in-house IT guys got "reassigned" most of them just retired.

SO, it turned out that all our data was required to be kept forever and no one knew how to get it out of our home-built system. Heh, heh, they called the old geeks (some retired to Florida) and ended up paying them a small fortune to dig out the data from these ancient systems. What a hoot to talk to our old buddies about how they had all but blackmailed Megacorp to come back for a few weeks. Poetic justice but YMMV.

 

[CO-guy]

I figured that out, too. When I worked for megacorp, I used to almost always get the worst, most behind projects to clean up every year. I actually liked scheduling, budgeting and getting projects on track, but I got pretty burned out with no down time and the constant stream of cleaning up projects someone else started and then mismanaged.

Bingo! I spent several years building a skillset to take on specific kinds of oversight projects. In exchange, I was promised a promotion to a position where I had already assisted in writing the job description. When the position was approved, it was given to someone with no training or experience who, literally, did nothing but her boss for the next four years.

After being denied a promotion, I took my skills and experience and started offering my services to other organizations as a consultant, which has been a huge financial boost to my online consulting business. Last year the "doing nothing" and "doing the boss" were both discovered around the same time. Shortly after, I was approached to assist with cleanup and it was gratifying to respond with a simple, "no." The only thing more gratifying was learning that the execs looked externally for assistance with specific projects and were referred back to me.

 

[mf15]

Panmunjom Korea 1971,in the Army was at the peace table with the MDL running down the middle of the room. MDL=Military Demarcation Line. Anyway no one else in the room so stepped across into North Korea. Then it hit me,could get shot,over here.
Not a nice place even to visit.
Also even though I was in the Army,had to sign a paper that the US gov't was not
responsible if anything happened.
Oldmike

 

[Koolau]

Also even though I was in the Army,had to sign a paper that the US gov't was not
responsible if anything happened.
Oldmike

Heh, heh, I thought that went without saying, er, signing.

Fortunately, I missed out on my MacNamara Fellowship to scenic SE Asia. High draft number. Thanks for your service.

 

[travelover]

........ MacNamara Fellowship .........

I've never heard that one.

 

[mf15]

Duty station was Camp Stanley,went on a tour to Panmunjom. Since was not actually
on duty,thats why I had to sign the release statement. Went up there with gun jeeps.
At the time when our unit A 1/15 Field Artillery went across the river into the DMZ
area we got hostile fire pay. Hey an extra $65/month back in the day was great.
Oldmike

 

[Koolau]

I've never heard that one.

The black humor of the era has slipped into legend now. Being prime draft bate during that time was life altering, though nothing like actually going. Hats off to all who served - and Welcome Home!

 

[travelover]

The black humor of the era has slipped into legend now. Being prime draft bate during that time was life altering, though nothing like actually going. Hats off to all who served - and Welcome Home!

Oh, I know, my draft number was something like 40. I have nothing but admiration for the guys that served.

 

[mf15]

Draft # was 65,so enlisted for 2 years. Why? That way could not be drafted
into the Marines. Pre induction physical saw them pulling guys out to be Marines.
Love Marines,just did not want to be one.
Oldmike

 

[Jenna]

Work will never love you back

 

[aja8888]

Panmunjom Korea 1971,in the Army was at the peace table with the MDL running down the middle of the room. MDL=Military Demarcation Line. Anyway no one else in the room so stepped across into North Korea. Then it hit me,could get shot,over here.
Not a nice place even to visit.
Also even though I was in the Army,had to sign a paper that the US gov't was not
responsible if anything happened.
Oldmike

Similar experience:

It was 1966, in the Air Force, and I was overseas on a nuclear missile launch team with four 1.1 megaton warheads sitting on top of our four tactical missiles, all ready to be sent "East" when the call from the 38th Tactical Missile Command came.

Our Commander came to our hardened control center one morning while we were on alert status and told us that if we had to "let them go", it would take 12 minutes to get them off, warhead armed, under booster. We knew that. We practiced that monthly. Then he said to us that we would never get the 4th bird off because the enemy Mig's would be "laying eggs" on the site at minute 11.

Oh. At 23 years old, I just realized I could be dead in an instant and never get to go home again.

 

[RobbieB]

Live fast, die young and leave a good looking corpse.

Although, after being hit by nukes, no one is going to look good.

And here we are again, back to the edge....

So have as much fun as possible while there is still time -

 

[big-papa]

Siblings. I come from a very large family. For years I could only see the differences between myself and them and the it seemed odd that sharing such a relatively short common experience of growing up together should matter much as we all age. But that view has changed over the years. While most of them live within a 50 mile radius of where we grew up, whenever I go home to visit I end up seeing all of them, either together or one at a time. And no matter how long it's been since we last saw each other, we pick up right where we left off as if it were only yesterday.

Love my sibs..

Cheers,
Big-Papa

 

[Gumby]

Similar experience:

It was 1966, in the Air Force, and I was overseas on a nuclear missile launch team with four 1.1 megaton warheads sitting on top of our four tactical missiles, all ready to be sent "East" when the call from the 38th Tactical Missile Command came.

Our Commander came to our hardened control center one morning while we were on alert status and told us that if we had to "let them go", it would take 12 minutes to get them off, warhead armed, under booster. We knew that. We practiced that monthly. Then he said to us that we would never get the 4th bird off because the enemy Mig's would be "laying eggs" on the site at minute 11.

Oh. At 23 years old, I just realized I could be dead in an instant and never get to go home again.

When I was about the same age, I was on a ballistic missile submarine. We just assumed we would never get all 16 of our missiles launched before they found us and sank us.

The upside of that realization is that you probably will be substantially less fearful for the rest of your life.

 

[pb4uski]

...This to me was a life game changer. ...

What was your greatest epiphany?

Actually two within about 5 years, but with a common theme.

First epiphany:

When I left home for college, it was the first time that I was totally off on my own and I was more focused on fun for pb4uski than studies and as a result did poorly my first semester. When DM wrote out the check for the second semester she made it clear that was the last one unless my grades improved. I did better, but not great. It was a continuation of academically doing the minimal needed to get by and not get in trouble rather than doing what was needed to excel.

That following summer of 1974 was a difficult job environment for college kids. I ended up landing a job at a tire shop as a jack-of-all-trades, from selling tires on the showroom floor, to picking up loads of tires from other company locations, to delivering tires to customers, to unloading tire deliveries, to working in the garage installing tires, doing oil changes, etc. I was making minimum wage and working in the shop alongside guys who were just a little older than me an not making much more... and certainly a struggling living wage. That experience of sweating my a$$ off in the summer heat and humidity made it dawn on me that if I didn't take full advantage of the college opportunity that there was a good chance that I was going to be them in a couple years and incentivized me to focus more on my studies... I was consistently dean's list from that point forward but the damage had already been done to my GPA... I ended up graduating with a 2.975 GPA... 0.0025 short of the 3.0 GPA hurdle needed to graduate with honors.

Second epiphany:

History repeats itself. After college I landed a good job for $10,500 a year in a mid-size city near home and settled into an apartment with a college friend who also landed a job at the same firm. It was the first time that I had had any money to speak of and my lifestyle was still that of a poor college student. We often hit the bars and clubs hard many night chasing women, would close the bar, go home and get a few hours sleep and then get up and do it all over again.

I thought that I was doing ok and after my first year sat down with the managing partner for my first review. He started out saying that they though that I was a bright young guy... at which point I thought "Ah, this is going to be really good"... but he continued that they didn't think I was applying myself worth a lick. The remaining message boiled down to that in 6 months they would either promote me or fire my a$$.

It was the wake-up message that I needed and they promoted my 5 months later.

P.S. I left the firm 6 months after they promoted me, to move to another city with one of those women that I had been chasing, who I now wake up next to each morning.

 

[pb4uski]

... whenever I go home to visit I end up seeing all of them, either together or one at a time. And no matter how long it's been since we last saw each other, we pick up right where we left off as if it were only yesterday. ...

+1 And sometimes it is a bit scary at that.

 

[brett]

Be yourself. Don't follow the crowd. Think out of the box. Keep moving forward. Be a life longer learner. Be thankful for what you have, the opportunities you have had and help others attain their goals.

 

[tutan]

There are supposedly hundreds of billions of galaxies which contain billions of stars each and galaxies are separated by millions of light years of empty space. Even our nearest galaxy neighbor is millions of light years from us. So I was amazed to realize that all the stars we can see in the night sky with or without using a telescope are only those in the Milky Way. Maybe this is obvious but an epiphany for me.