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Friday, October 9, 2009

Everything I Learned About Life I Learned from Working in Retail: Fact #2


Fact #2:

Just when you get the store looking good (everything in its place, floor swept, shelves stocked), a truck comes. And not just any truck. A truck with at least 90, 100 boxes on it, and that store that looked so good before is now crowded with a mountain of cardboard. It's daunting, to say the least. 100 boxes of items to be displayed, clothes to be hung and put away, shirts to be folded (ug), and shoes to be stocked. And customers are still pouring in, ignorant of the mountainous pile of STUFF at the back of the store. A newb to the retail industry would completely freak-out-panic and hide in the bathroom until his/her shift ended. But you? No, you are much wiser than that. You know that that mountainous pile of STUFF is really just one box after one box after one box. And you know that if you take that mountainous pile of STUFF one box at a time, you will get through it. Maybe not that day, maybe not the next, but it will eventually go back to being a cleanly swept floor in a neat and tidy store.

Translated:

Life can pile up, and pile up FAST. What was once manageable and totally smile-inducing can quickly become OHMYGODMAKEITSTOP. And it is easy, oh so easy, to let it pile up around you until you have to hide somewhere to hyperventilate in peace. But hyperventilating won't fix the problem; trying to tackle everything at once isn't the answer. Just step back, take a deep breath, and choose one box to start on. Take care of that one box. Move on to one more box. Take care of that box. And so on and so forth, until you come to find the not only is your life a lot less OHMYGODMAKEITSTOP, but you are back to living a smile-inducing existence.

And if that doesn't fill you with life-will-be-better goodness, just pretend you work with these people. That should make your life's amount of awesome increase by like tenfold.

11 comments:

Unknown said...

Best. Video. Ever.

Kate said...

Superb video. Classic song! At 0:44 the guy looks a little like Jimmy Carr.

Unknown said...

Bless you. Just exactly what I needed to read this morning, facing a mountain of web pages that need to be written, a sinkful of dishes, and at least five loads of laundry. And squabbling children - they are never far from my keyboard...

Mariah Irvin said...

I sang along with the video. It was pretty amazing; I wish I had been in it!

My favorite part was the woman who wouldn't sing.

Renee Collins said...

Oh awesomeness. :) lol

It's a good addition to the analogy, that even when life can pile up on you, hopefully you have some great people to make it more bearable. :)

Sara Raasch said...

Kat -- Yes, yes it is. I'm going to marry the guy in the plaid shirt.

Kate -- Ha! He does! I didn't notice that...

Kristy -- Glad I could help :) One web page at a time...

Mariah -- I don't know why she wouldn't sing; I would've be all over that!

Renee -- Very true :) People quite often make that mountain of STUFF far more bearable

Nikki said...

I love that every time I add a funny link to my facebook page, it pops up here a few minutes later :)

Hayley Lovell said...

Ah wisdom, wisdom, I swear every time I read your blog I gain wisdom, again looking at the glass half full. I'll watch the vid when I get the chance but I'm stealing time on the computer at my cousins so...but I bet its great!

K. M. Walton said...

Good one!

Boy did I need a smile today.

Sara Raasch said...

Nikki -- You are my inspiration, cousin :)

Hayley -- The video is quite great! You should definitely watch it!

KM -- Glad I could help :)

lisa and laura said...

Ooh, this makes me want to get to work. So much editing and writing to do. Amazing how it piles up when you're gone for a weekend.