What I learned from reading Driven: An Autobiography by Larry Miller.
I can remember the moment my life changed forever.
I had an epiphany one morning, and nearly every detail of that moment is burned into the hard drive of my brain.
It was March 1971, and I was at work managing the parts department at a Toyota dealership in Colorado.
I had just taken a parts order over the phone from a body shop, and I was checking to see what parts I had in stock when, like a bucket of cold water, it hit me.
Here I was, 27 years old, married, with two children and one on the way, and I was responsible for raising and supporting those children, providing food and shelter and college and housing and much more while preparing for old age and retirement.
And I realized I had nothing to fall back on.
I had no college education, no special training.
All I had was my energy and whatever talent I had been blessed with.
It scared me.
The feeling was so overwhelming that I stopped what I was doing to ponder the matter.
I decided I had to be extremely good at something, and the thing I was best at was being a Toyota parts manager.
That night I worked until 10:00 p.m.
it was the start of my 90 hours a week work schedule.
From that moment on, I began working from 730 in the morning until 910 or eleven at night, six days a week.
I did this for 20 years.
I reasoned that other dealers had the same parts and roughly the same prices to offer.
I believed service and hustle were the things that would set me apart.
I would simply outwork them.
I would become so good that it could not be denied.
I was obsessed with doing everything I could and accomplishing as much as I could.