What If You Knew Exactly What To Do Each Time?
An unexpected lesson from a chalk mark and a maintenance bill.
Henry Ford once received a $10,000 bill from General Electric and freaked out.
The bill, as the story goes, was sent after an engineer visited one of his plants and left a chalk mark on a malfunctioning generator, indicating a part to be replaced.
Unsettled, Ford asked for an itemized bill, his request being promptly answered:
- Making chalk mark ___ $1.
- Knowing where to make mark ___ $9,999.
Ford paid the bill.
What if you knew where to make the chalk marks in your life?
Say your teenage son is acting outrageously. Drawing a parallel with Ford’s itemized bill, we would have:
- Making chalk mark = talking to your son
- Knowing where to make mark = knowing exactly what to say
Another example: getting stronger.
- Making chalk mark = going to the gym
- Knowing where to make mark = knowing exactly what to do in the gym (how many reps, how many sets, which load)
Sure, taking action (making the chalk mark) is important.
But —
Knowing exactly which action to take (where to make the mark) is what separates success from failure.
Learning where to make the chalk marks takes time and effort
“If you knew how much work went into it, you wouldn’t call it genius.” ― Michelangelo
Back to the Ford anecdote, the engineer who left the famous chalk mark, Charles Proteus Steinmetz, was one of the most brilliant electrical engineers of his time.
Not only had he vast knowledge, but he also spent two straight days and nights listening to the malfunctioning generator and taking notes. Then, and only then, he knew exactly what had to be done to fix the machine.
So, sorry to shatter your dreams, but knowing what to say to your rebelling teenage son won’t come easy to you. You have to be prepared, which translates to hard work.
It pays out — at the end, all the hard work pays out
Can you imagine yourself navigating life knowing exactly what to do each time?
- Picture yourself delivering that perfect line during a work presentation.
- Or knowing which words to say to your wife after that terrible fight last night.
- Or deciding confidently that the time has come to move to another city.
In all these situations you are making chalk marks.
Question is: will you know exactly where to make them?
When you see a master like Michelangelo sculpting a stone, using the hammer and chisel like you use fork and knife to cut a sirloin steak, you may be tempted to think it is easy. Well, it’s not.
Work on yourself. Become a better parent, husband, worker — heck, become a better person. Learn new stuff, put it into practice, pay attention to what’s working and what’s not. Repeat.
Oh, and don’t forget the chalk!
