Thanks Zig

Life-changing inspiration arrives in the strangest places.  Mine came late one night in a high school media center.

Around 9:30 p.m., I’d take a break. My schedule had me working from 3:30 p.m. until 11 p.m. And during that shift, I  had two fifteen minute breaks and a 30 minute dinner.  It was the spring of 1992 and I was a high school custodian. It wasn’t exactly my dream job.

I called it my fifth year in high school.

The school I cleaned, Alan C. Pope High School in Marietta, Georgia, was (and is) an excellent school full of kind people.  The media specialists were my friends so I took pride in cleaning their offices.  That particular night, I turned off the vacuum at 9:30, walked out into the library and started to poke around the books.  On the shelf was a book called “See You At The Top” written by a strange-named author named Zig Ziglar.  I thumbed through it and started reading a few pages.  Ziglar was from an exotic sounding place called Yazoo City. Of course, only someone named Zig would come from such a place.   Some of the book was corny. Some of it was hokey. But much of it was profound.

Zig hooked me immediately.

I had big dreams when I graduated from the University of Tennessee — only to watch them fall flat. When I entered the real world in 1991, the economy went into a tailspin. So like so many graduates today, I moved back home. It was my first taste of defeat.  But it was only a defeat because I thought it was.

Zig straightened me out.

A few months into my year as a janitor, I had gone to church and heard the Parable of the Talents.  I realized I was burying my talent and decided I needed an attitude change.  Zig taught me exactly the steps I needed to make that change and turn my life around.

Within a year, I was working at a newspaper in Marietta.  Within two, I was at a small paper in Texas. And by the third year, I was the creative director and cartoonist for Copley News Service in San Diego, California.  My attitude helped me reach a new altitude.

A few months into my job at Copley, the company sent me to a motivational seminar.  I was able to meet Zig Ziglar at a meet-and-greet lunch.  I went through the line and he gave me one of those “pull you along” handshakes.  But I stopped, paused, looked the man straight in the eye. Then I thanked him for changing my life.

I’m so thankful now that I had that chance.

Zig Ziglar died Wednesday at the age of 86. He lived a long, fruitful life. He is survived by an amazing family.  When I think of his life, I think of my favorite Zig Ziglar quote: “You can have everything in life that you want if you just give enough other people what they want.”

He truly practiced what he preached.

Thank you, Zig for giving me what I wanted and needed.  May you rest in peace.