Who’s Model Are You Putting Together?

Whose Model are you Putting Together?

I remember putting together a plastic model of “The Fonz,” from Happy Days when I was a boy. I painted his jeans blue, his hair and jacket black, and his face was a deep bronze. (Must have had the wrong paint) I always wondered if my Dad had chosen the model for me or if I had chosen that model for myself.

Over the years and I have put together many other models following in my Dad’s footsteps. I put together cars, airplanes, and even a balsa wood airplane in college that actually flew. A couple of years ago I almost purchased a huge sailing ship to put together for my father. He had always wanted to construct such a masterpiece but never had. I was considering building it as a “labor of love” for him.

I recently brought home an old A-6 “Intruder” model airplane for my son, Nicolas, and wondered if he would follow in his father’s footsteps and put that model together one day. As I stored it on the shelf in his closet it suddenly hit me how closely I have modeled my father over the years.

When I was in 4th grade my father started his own business and was gone most of the time. He rarely came to my baseball games and I never saw him much through my elementary and high school years. When my son hit 4th grade I also started my own business, moved out of my home office and was “gone.” But, I modeled the opposite of my father by attending all of Nicolas’ sporting events and coached his basketball team.

There are always two ways to model the behaviors of the key people in our lives. We can model “towards” the examples they set for us or we can model “away” from the examples they set for us. I modeled towards my father in being entrepreneurial and away from him in one different aspect of fatherhood.

Which model are you choosing to put together in your life? How are you modeling your mother or father from when you were young? Are you modeling behaviors that empower you or dis-empower you? If you are walking around saying that you don’t have a good role model to create what you want, you are wrong. You have all you need in front of your eyes.

There is a great self study that tracked the lives of a pair of brothers who had an alcoholic father who was in and out of jail. One of the brothers grew to be a successful lawyer and businessman while the other became and alcoholic who was in and out of jail. The question of, “How did you become the man you are today?” was asked to each of them and they both gave the same answer. “How could I not, given who my father was?”

Look at the models in your life that are “not” what you want and be strong enough to do the exact opposite! If you remember things that you like from your childhood, do the same thing now. If you find yourself saying, “How can I have something different than this, after all, look at my parents, friend, etc…I don’t have a good role model.” Be strong enough to step up and do the opposite. If all of your buddy’s drink, stop drinking, if no one goes to the gym, get to the gym, if they argue and pick fights with their spouses, focus on giving to your spouse first. The rest will come in time and you will have developed your own model of success for yourself and who knows, maybe others will look at you model your success!

I love who I am now as a coach and father to my son, and it is because of the model my father gave me; EVEN THOUGH IT WAS “away” from what I wanted. By accepting the models that we have been given and choosing the life we want to put together for ourselves, there is acceptance and forgiveness towards the people who have given us the “away from” models. They are not the problem they are the solution. You just have to do the opposite! If you like who you are today it is because of who you modeled in the past; good or bad.

The A-6 airplane model is patiently sitting in the closet waiting for my son to choose to put together or not. Maybe he will or maybe he won’t. It is his choice what model to put together in his life. In the end, I hope to have built a model life that he can look up to and will be a great example for him.

Put your model life together even if the directions appear to be missing, you have seen it put together wrong in the past or you have a perfect example of how you would like it to be. You have all that you need right now to create what you most want in life. As you start to put the pieces of your model together; make no excuses and make it a masterpiece.