Jerry was the kind of guy you love to hate. He was
always in a good mood
and always had something positive to say. When
someone would ask him how he
was doing, he would reply, "If I were any better, I
would be twins!"

He was a unique manager because he had
several waiters who had followed him
around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason
the waiters followed Jerry
was because of his attitude. He was a natural
motivator. If an employee was
having a bad day, Jerry was there telling the
employee how to look on the
positive side of the situation.

S eeing this style really made me curious, so one
day I went up to Jerry and
asked him, "I don't get it! You can't be a positive
person all of the time.
How do you do it?"

Jerry replied, "Each morning I wake up and say to
myself, 'Jerry, you have
two choices today. You can choose to be in a
good mood or you can choose to
be in a bad mood.' I choose to be in a good
mood. Each time something bad
happens, I can choose to be a victim or I can
choose to learn from it. I
choose to learn from it. Every time someone
comes to me complaining, I can
choose to accept their complaining or I can point
out the positive side of
life. I choose the positive side of life."

"Yeah, right, it's not that easy," I protested.

"Yes, it is," Jerry said. "Life is all about choices.
When you cut way all
the junk, every situation is a choice. You choose
how you react to
situations. You choose how people will affect your
mood. You choose to be
in a good mood or bad mood. The bottom line: It's
your choice how you live
life."

I reflected on what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left
the restaurant
industry to start my own business. We lost touch,
but I often thought about
him when I made a choice about life instead of
reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that Jerry did
something you are never
supposed to do in a restaurant business: he left
the back door open one
morning and was held up at gunpoint by three
armed robbers. While trying to
open the safe, his hand, shaking from
nervousness, slipped off the
combination. The robbers panicked and shot him.
Luckily, Jerry was found
relatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma
center.

After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive
care, Jerry was released
from the hospital with fragments of the bullets still
in his body.

I saw Jerry about six months after the accident.
When I asked him how he
was, he replied, "If I were any better, I'd be twins.
Wanna see my scars?"

I declined to see his wounds, but did ask him what
had gone through his
mind as the robbery took place. "The first thing
that went through my mind
was that I should have locked the back door,"
Jerry replied. "Then, as I
lay on the floor, I remembered that I had two
choices: I could choose to
live, or I could choose to die. I chose to live."

"Weren't you scared? Did you lose
consciousness?" I asked.

Jerry continued, "The paramedics were great.
They kept telling me I was
going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into
the emergency room and I
saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors
and nurses, I got really
scared. In their eyes, I read, 'He's a dead man.'

"I knew I needed to take action."

"What did you do?" I asked.

"Well, there was a big, burly nurse shouting
questions at me," said Jerry.
"She asked if I was allergic to anything. 'Yes,' I
replied. The doctors and
nurses stopped working as they waited for my
reply. I took a deep breathe
and yelled, 'Bullets!' Over their laughter, I told
them. 'I am choosing to
live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead."

Jerry lived thanks to the skill of his doctors, but
also because of his
amazing attitude. I learned from him that every day
we have the choice to
live fully. Attitude, after all, is everything.