She’s Going to Change the World

You can take the girl out of West Chicago, but you can’t take the West Chicago out of the girl, as they say.  I have spent some time pondering this notion in the aftermath of our successful grand opening of our new building and while celebrating all of the advances and milestones we have accomplished.  We have come such a long way since our humble beginnings at our first location in West Chicago, but in ways, we still operate the same way and preserve the core values of integrity, loyalty and quality.  We have shiny new digs, gleaming equipment and a gorgeous, state of the art facility.  But in so many ways, I still feel like that little girl from the western suburbs that was constantly clawing her way to making ends meet by way of getting up the same number of times she got knocked down.  I have eaten plenty of humble sandwiches throughout my tenure and been given numerous costly lessons that most times I didn’t even know I signed up for.  And I have learned so much this way that I must give some kind of credit to it.

Growth comes with its own set of challenges and when you don’t have the background or wherewithal to incite the things necessary to support that growth, it can be some very scary waters to navigate.  I have often taken a Hard Knocks University approach to business, learning as I go, constantly tugging at my boot straps, figuring things out as needs and the market change.  That being said, I still wake up everyday feeling as though I could lose it all at any given second (and be right back in that little office in West Chicago or worse – not even there at all), providing all of the motivation one could ever need to keep their claws and their mind sharp to the ever changing needs of the business, the market and the people that fill both.  Often times I wished I had the fancy letters behind my name to substantiate my ability, sometimes feeling lesser because I do not possess them.  But like many great business people (Bill Gates, Oprah, Michael Dell) who did not obtain these same credentials, they proved to their peers and the world that it was not necessary to have an expensive degree or menagerie of letters behind their name to facilitate change, prosper and ultimately succeed.

I’m still learning (and LOVE to) and hope that my constant yearning and quest for knowledge will continue to serve the various aspects of the Brick Chick and her ever growing Posse well.  It’s one of the most exciting and rewarding things we can do for ourselves.  Information is so powerful and so accessible, it always waits for us and is there for the taking.  And once you have it, no one can take it from you.  This is such a powerful and beautiful thing and I know I owe it all, even without those fancy letters, to the pursuit of knowledge.