Victim or Victor Checkpoint 4: RIP JRS 1.12.36 - 12.28.20 Lessons Learned From Dad

My father John Roy Sanders was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer in June of 2020 and succumbed to the disease 7 months later. 

Along with so many changes that came with 2020 our family has been navigating the pending and alarmingly immediate loss of a happy and kind patriarch.

In keeping with our V2 theme I would like to share a few lessons learned from my father as we leap into 2021 with the hope of Covid free world but the experience to know that more storms lurk.

John Sanders (Oil man by day, builder and family man by night) 

• Riverdale High School, North Dakota
• Iowa State Class of 1959 Electrical Engineer
• Chevron Corporation 1959-1995 
• Married to Carolyn Smith Sanders 1959-2020

A Sanders - "Can Do Anything" 

• Work the problem, and trust the process 
• If the pandemic has shown us anything it is that we need to be able to use the constraints of having things taken away from us as a way to develop our abilities and skills.
• Being ready to adapt and not have all the pieces of a puzzle is a mindset and I received weekly training for this in the backyard as we tackled whatever project that was next.
• It wasn't arrogance that a Sanders could do anything, it was a commitment to stay with a problem and where a process was known to stay with that process and see it through.
• CURIOSITY and PERSISTENCE were hand in glove 
• We imagine that for most of you 2020 provided countless situations where you applied these skills and are preparing for 2021 to not be as smooth as everyone seems to think it will be. 

School is a means to an end 

• Skills vs Habits 
• When struggling with a class in school my father would repeat the phrase, "School is a means to an end"
• It was lost on me what that meant for a long time but I got the point, he cared about more than my grades and a work ethic with a good attitude were at the top of the list.
• What he knew was that in life it didn't matter if you had skills in all areas but that you had the habits to build upon the areas that you had strengths.
• What we have noticed as well is that desire and drive are sometimes developed out of struggles and mistakes and lower grades than one hopes.
• Sir Ken Robinson's book "The Element" with the accompanying Ted Talk (70 Million Views and Counting) really nails what my dad was driving at.
• Observe where a person loses track of time, build around that a series of constraints to develop your abilities and then get your hands bloody in the pursuit and practice of improvement. 

Show up to work days and enjoy the work

• Piedmont Community Church had a work day in 1978 and as an 8 year old I tagged along with my dad and we were given the task of weeding a hillside and trimming some ivy.
• We were new to town having moved from Alaska the year prior but yard work was nothing new for us.
• The people we worked alongside became friends for all of us and the shared experience of giving back to our community was unique.
• Fast forward to 2020 my son Ryan has been helping me in the yard for years and was looking to earn some gas money now that he was 16.
• I told him to make a flier and knock on 30 doors in the surrounding area offering to mow lawns and do general yard work and he would be just fine.
• How will this work? He asked. 
• "Because you have been working next to me for years and we know how to work and when you take that same level of energy to their yard, word will spread".
• 8 months later he has a nice business going and his confidence is soaring.
• 2021 is going to ask all of us to pitch in to help the community again and again and most of the tools we will bring will be either John Sanders tools or the tools John Sanders gave us. 

Looking forward we imagine that you are champing at the bit to get going in 2021, these first 105 days appear primed for great activity especially since the lock downs happened in Q1 last year. 

Our aim is to work our plans hard but to also have another Plan B and Plan C in the drawer for when the next curve ball comes our way and when it does we will be emulating John Roy Sanders often.

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