My Genius Story

by Jesse Freese

 

My journey in finding my genius is an interesting story that also is about coincidence.

 

The story begins in St. Paul, MN, in 1994. I had just finished a very nice dinner with my wife, Sue, and two of our good friends, Ed and Barbara Tilford. Ed and Barbara were also my partners in Fissure, our training and development company. Ed is my mentor and had been my boss off and on for most of 17 years in our previous life as managers with Sperry/Unisys.

 

As we left the restaurant Ed, Barbara and Sue were drawn immediately to the book store across the street. All three were regular book readers and quickly decided to walk off a little dinner and cruise the bookstore for a few books to take home and read. I read books, but not on a regular basis, and when I did pick up a book, it was usually a "business" book that was either recommended by Ed or someone else I respected. Needless to say, Sue was always encouraging me to pick a book for fun, but I was drawn to the business book isle regardless. I looked at my list of recommended books that I kept in my wallet (yes – I’m one of those people) and began to look for one among the titles on the shelf.

 

That is when I came across a book with a very intriguing title that I just couldn’t resist picking off the shelf. It was called "Artful Work". I looked it over and was immediately hooked on the idea of "genius". I showed it to Ed, thinking he would feel the same way, but he had already selected one or two books and didn’t seem interested in "Artful Work".

 

After agonizing for a few minutes, I bought the book and read it in a few days time. The concept of genius made sense to me and I began thinking about how comfortable I felt providing project management and leadership training to our corporate clients and believing I was "doing" work that must be closely aligned with my genius.

 

We belonged to a network of trainers that got together every nine months and at the beginning of each meeting, everyone always shared something that was important to them. Many shared books they had read and how the books had impacted them. I rarely shared a book, but at this meeting I couldn’t wait to share "Artful Work". I knew it resonated with at least a few people and went home satisfied that some might even buy and read the book.

 

A few months later, George Davis, who organized the meetings called to say he had not only read the book, but was so interested in this concept of genius that he had actually contacted the author. It turned out that Dick Richards would not only be at our next meeting, but he would be there a few days before to conduct a genius finding workshop for those who were interested. I didn’t hesitate to sign up. In preparation for the workshop I decided to read Artful Work again and spent some time thinking about what my genius might be. It was also during this second reading that I was reminded that Dick Richards was from Philadelphia at one time and being a Philadelphian myself, I was really looking forward to meeting him.

 

I arrived for the genius workshop early wearing my beloved red Phillies cap. I introduced myself to Dick and it didn’t take long before our conversation turned to Philadelphia and specifics about where we had spent time there. After sharing that I had grown up in Lansdale, a suburb of Philly, Dick asked the name of my high school and the year I had graduated. In one of those weird cases of coincidence, Dick had worked as a guidance counselor at my high school during my junior and senior years. He asked me my name again, and upon restating it he asked me if I had a brother. You see, Dick was the counselor for the "challenging" students, and while I had managed to stay out of his office, my brother, Donald, had spent many a session with Dick. We had a good time catching up and I had one of the most powerful two days of my life finding my genius with about eight close colleagues and friends. Dick created clarity for us as we worked through the exercises identifying clues to our geniuses. With each exercise I came closer to my genius. Toward the end of the second day I said it, but I knew this was important to get right and I wanted to leave "it" open in case I was wrong.

 

I left the meeting feeling fairly confident about my genius, but today I’m even more confident in "guiding safe passage". If you want to know more about genius, check out Dick's site: http://www.theclearspace.com or contact me at Fissure.

 

Jesse Freese Fissure