Mark Twain said it one way:
"There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist."
Nike says it another:
"Just Do It."
Nike's advertising slogan grew out of a 1988 meeting between some Nike employees and an advertising agency during which one of the ad guys said, "You Nike guys, you just do it."
Poof, Nike is off and running with a new slogan and a new image.
The slogan, accompanied by the ever-present swoosh, pushed Nike sales beyond the industry leader, Reebok, and Nike has never stepped backward.
The early warning sign of impending pessimism or the first step toward procrastination, which leads to pessimism, are the word "should" and the phrase "should have."
I cringe when I hear the word directed at me. "You should ...," someone will say and I'll think to myself, "No, I shouldn't." It is an open rebellion, going back to a childhood growing up in a small town full of university professors who treated everyone as inferiors.
Who says it? Politicians say it. Preachers say it. Bosses say it. Coworkers say it. Even friends say it, although if they say it habitually they get dropped from the Friend List. They don't become enemies; they merely become someone I don't want to be around.
Worst of all: I say it about myself. Janet says it about herself. The two of us say it collectively.
Example: We bought a house with a swimming pool about four years ago. The pool had limited use because the heater didn't work and you couldn't separate the hot tub from the pool, meaning you couldn't heat the spa even if you had a working heater.
For four years we have been saying "We should fix the pool." We said that, and looked at our pretty, useless pool from our breakfast table window.
Last week, I was cleaning up some pool maintenance paperwork, showed the papers to Janet and we decided on the spot to "just do it."
Four days later, we are in our like-new pool and Janet is saying, "I should deadhead those flowers, I should replenish the flower shelves, I should get the long pole and clean up the cobwebs at the top of the lanai ..."
I am saying, "We should make it a vow to get in the pool every day, we should live up to our vow of keeping a day and week just for us, I should put a new gas cylinder in the grill ..."
It had started all over again. We began walking along the path to doing nothing.
So we made a vow to avoid the "shoulds" because they create an atmosphere of negativism and inactivity. They are a downer, causing tension in us and between us. Besides, they allow us to put off to tomorrow...
Ok, column is done.
What should I do now? Oh, yeah, need to buy some workout shoes. Sorry, Nike, I am addicted to New Balance.
