Stephen Bleile

When your potential employer asks you a question he wants you to tell him about your car. No matter the question he is interested in only one thing. Your Car.  When he asks about your education tell him about your car.  When he asks about your relevant experience tell him about your car.

Actually, it’s just the sort of thing that everyone wants to hear you talk about.  Your dentist, your friends, your BFF, and even your mom. Your car your car your car.

C.a.r, you see, is actually a clever acronym for

Circumstance

Action

Result

So really, people wnat to hear your stories.  They want to hear your interactions with your world.  They want to know what you did and what happened as a result.

That being said, I should confess that this piece is not really about your car.  It is actually about living a story that is so enriched by creative action and the hope that your initiatives can make your environment better that  people will want to read your biography while searching for the HBO mini series of the same title.

The car analogy is convenient.  In fact there is another that is built on the chassis of the same frame. (That frame being a car.)

Everyone is born with a measure of talent, creativity, and passion.  So far as I can see no two are born identical. Unlike a car, every human being has unique insights, ideas, and impetus to interact with their world. (Only in the dreary  halls of dullardrum do we see people as all-the-same or equally talented and passionate in the same way.)

Cars are amazingly intricate pieces of machinery.  Sufficiently so that most people take their car to the shop to get it fixed, despite astronomical shop fees, because they just have no idea what’s going on in there. Sufficiently so that while at the wrecker when asked by my brother if the car we were looking at had a starter I confirmed that it did – not knowing I was looking at the transmission.

That being said, and to make the analogy work let us reduce it down to some simple parts.

At the most basic level there are three parts to a working car.

1. Fuel (gas, or petrol for my int’l audience.) 2. Engine 3. Wheels.

That should help us all get on the same page.

Now, let’s talk a little bit about engines.  In the late 1600′s a fine gentleman named Christian Huygens developed an internal combustion engine that would run on gun powder.  http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarsgasa.htm His attempts are not noted to be particularly successful but he did pave the way for Mr(s). Otto, Benz and Daimler to develop the basic mechanics of how the gas engine in most vehicles you see today work.(Despite trying to take over the world, twice, we can see the Germans have made some contributions to our lives.)

The basic idea of an internal combustion engine is that fuel and air will be mixed in precise proportions, pressurized, made to burn (explode), and in so doing create motion.This motion is then, hopefully, transformed into some usable force:  in the case of a car it is used to turn the wheels.

Let us say that creativity and passion are the air and fuel in the engine.  Creativity that all-seeing mistress and passion that desirous captain make for quite an explosive duo.

What then in the engine?  Discipline.

Whether it is external or internal, discipline is that steely part in us that must be strong enough to contain the explosion of creativity and passion.  It goes by many names – hard work, determination, commitment, hardheadedness etc.

Discipline mixes passion with creativity in precise measures, pressurizes them and then lights them on fire to create.

Without discipline fuel that is burned is useless to a car.  It can be used to burn the car, i suppose, but i highly doubt that anyone sets out to burn to the ground the car they wish to drive.

Short of not having an engine at all engines must be set up right.  An engine may mix too much air or too much fuel.  Either combination produces lack- luster performance.

And so it is true in us.  If we have tonnes of passion about a certain topic but no creative solution we will likely not make an impact beyond our living room.  If we have tonnes of creativity but nothing to be passionate about we will likely be highly frustrated individuals (whose moms would really like us to move out soon.)

Wheels.  Wheels come next.  Without them the aforementioned is useless.  (Well, everything before is useless provided you are using your car for more than a couch.)

Wheels are where all of the force produced in the engine goes.  Of all the parts they are the most simple, the most useful, the most exhilarating and the most scary.  Most accidents, if I’m not mistaken, take place when the car is in motion – after all.

Wheels are action.

When passion, creativity, discipline and action work together the results are wonderful stories.  Stories revealing the extrodinary coming from the ordinary.  Stories that capture people acting with passion and creativity in every walk of life. Stories that graciously grab your attention, warm your heart, and seduce your imagination into letting go and believing that your own story can resound in the hearts of your peers, friends, family, neighbors, nation and world.