THE SECRET INGREDIENT

I can still see him, peering over his glasses as he looked through my brochures and business synopsis. After a

prolonged, uncomfortable silence he finally spoke.

“So you want to be a hot shot DJ,” he asked?
“Well, I’m not sure I want to be a hot shot,” I countered and then explained to him that, after 15 years of being a part-time DJ, I was ready to try to make it as a full time entertainer.
“Why would you want to leave [your current employment] after 15 years to pursue THIS,” he inquired?
“Because this is my passion,” I confessed to him. “This is what I love to do.”
“WRONG ANSWER,” he stated.
So I took a second attempt. “Well, I have maxed out as far as I will go in my current employment,” I explained of my job at a family run weekly newspaper.  ”I just think I have much more potential here.”
“WRONG ANSWER,” he stated emphatically again.
“Then I guess I don’t know what the right answer is,” I confessed.
And he put it to me simply: “To make money! That is the only reason to be in business.”

~ REQUEST A CONSULTATION ~

The man’s name was Terry and he was a representative of the Small Business Development Center, a government agency designed to provide a vast array of technical assistance to small businesses and aspiring entrepreneurs. And over our next three or four sessions he taught me a lot on what is necessary to sustain a successful business. There are great mechanics, wonderful cooks and fantastic photographers, he noted, but that does not make them great business owners. Now in my fifth year as the owner and operator of this mom and pop shop I call Alexxus Entertainment I understand what he was telling me. And I’ve learned a lot along the way.

“There is joy in work. There is no happiness except in the realization that we have accomplished something,”

But of all of the things I’ve learned I have to say now that I disagree with him somewhat. It’s not all about the money, it’s still about passion, about finding something that you love to do and be able to make a living at it. Yes you have to work enough and charge enough to sustain a business and support your family, but if I ever am just going through the motions and continuing on as a wedding emcee/entertainer just because I want the money, then it’s time to take my microphone away from me. Now that I have had the opportunity to be around so many other entrepreneurs over the past five years I find that it is passion that is the common denominator among those that have been truly successful. “There is joy in work. There is no happiness except in the realization that we have accomplished something,” Henry Ford once said. And true enough, the way I see it, those that have been most giving of themselves look to be the ones that go the furthest. I’ve always believed that talent will only take you so far, and intelligence will only take you so far, but drive and perseverance is what takes you over the top.

In my twenty plus years as a part-time-turned-full-time-DJ I have seen many come and go in the wedding profession. Some blame economics, others reason it’s because of the attitudes of the customers they’ve had to deal with. Or some simply because they set their price point too low and did not have enough capital to reinvest in their business when new technology came along or when doing a pair of bridal shows and placing an ad in the Yellow Pages was no longer the answer for marketing. But what I really have seen in those that call it quits was the loss of their passion.

"Build your own dreams, or someone else will hire you to build theirs."
Farrah Gray 

It was not long ago that that was me. I began to feel our weddings were reruns. I was struggling to motivate myself to get out of my office chair and network. But in a span of six months I attended a pair of DJ related conventions and participated in a business core strengthening program through our local chamber. Nothing reinvigorates you like being around successful individuals and sharing ideas.

So I am recharged and ready to go again. I have new unique ideas that I want to offer to couples, I want to tell their story to their family and closest friends, I want to be a part of their one-and-only-wedding day.

If your passion has begun to wane, if you’ve ever asked yourself what do you need to do to get more out of life, or everyday seems like a repeat of the ones before, I suggest a good motivational book, seek out a DVD of a great speaker or enroll in a class or two related to something that you enjoy.

Rediscover your passion and prepare for the fulfillment that it will bring.

Michael J. Lenstra is a twenty plus year veteran of the Mobile Disc Jockey Industry, a full time entertainer, and owner of Alexxus Entertainment in Dubuque, IA.