Have you ever experienced a broken product? It just does not do the job you paid for it to do. You try, you finagle. You adjust. It does not do the job you have put money out to have done. No matter what you do or how you rearrange it, it does not work. It actually even brings the other products around it down too. They are not as functional as they could be because of this one product. It is not as if this product is not doing anything. The product is simply functioning in a useless way. It will not do what you need it to do and it will keep doing things you do not need it to do. And what’s worse, sometimes it even does things counterproductive to the environment it is in.

I feel like the broken product sometimes. Other times I look back at life and see points in my life where I was a broken product. I am never proud of those moments. Broken product moments are when I am not being an enhancement to the people around me. I am trying to do the right thing. I am trying to help. However, I am limited by my perspective or my understanding of the situation. Other times I am limited by my maturity, selfishness, or personal grievances. I am not idle am doing something. The question is, am I doing something productive or counterproductive. Am I operating as a feature or as a hindrance? Another way to ask this questions is, Am I doing the job I have been hired to do? I do not only mean in the professional sense but also the personal sense. For instance, my wife has hired me to be her husband, my friends have hired me to be a good friend, my landlord has hired me to rent their apartment. Hiring someone does not mean they are being paid for the job to be done. Hiring someone means they are given the tools and believed to be capable of the job to be done. (I will have to discuss my thoughts and the thoughts I have gleaned from others on this topic later.) When I do the job I have been hired for, I enhance my environment; but, when I do not do the job I have been hired for, I impede my environment from achieving it’s full potential.

I strive to be a feature to the people around me, to my friends, spouse, coworkers, and family. I try to be a feature. However, how can a feature know if it is a hindrance?

They are both trying to do what they are designed to do. They are both operational. They both are trying to move their agenda forward. However, how does their environment react? Is their environment a better place because they are operating in the way they are designed? Are the people around me better for knowing me?

Are you a feature or a hindrance? Are the people around you better for knowing you? Are you doing the job you’ve been hired to do?

Featuring,

–JT