So for a while now I’ve had this dreadful fear building up inside of me. I’m a fake! They don’t know but I’m actually a horrible student! And I smell funny. One day I’m going to come into the AdLab and people are going to look at me and say “dude, your horrible, how did you get in here?”
And I’ll respond, “Well…the door was unlocked”.
But that’s beside the point.
What I really want to say is that recently this fear was put to rest when it was pointed out to me that the majority of creative people are horrible students! That’s what makes them creative. As for smelling funny, it was also pointed out to me recently that there is this product called deodorant.
Connected to this fear however is perhaps a more dangerous one. What if I’m not actually even creative! I just snuck through all the applications and rode the coat tails of others. A while ago Jason Bagley came and spoke to the AdLab. He said a lot of good stuff, but one of the things that he expressed was this exact sentiment. He had these same feelings.
That boosted my confidence for a while but then I realized, “I’m not Jason Bagley, I’m Jonathan Osorio and I suck.”
About a month ago Jeff pulled me into his office and put this fear to rest, without even knowing it. He sat me down and told me, “You’ve got a ton of potential and I can see you doing great work here…” and he went on for a bit after that. You know, the whole Jeff inspirational speech that I’m sure we’ve all heard at one point or multiple points in our time in the AdLab. It worked though, really. That chat gave me the confidence to pick up and go for what I wanted at a time when I really might not have. Way to follow your gut Jeff!
I just wanted to take this chance to publicly say thanks, as Jeff prepares to leave us. In that short 5 minutes he might just have changed the path of my life. I’m sure there are many other paths that he affected but I think that even if that had been the only good thing you did in the AdLab (I’m not saying it was) it was worth it. So thanks, and in honor of Jeff I propose we move to never change the name of the Jeffies, and maybe name one of the computers Jeff. Or maybe get tattoos that say “Jeff” inside of a heart, like the mom ones.
One last thought. Because there are future generations that won’t get to talk to Jeff as he is leaving us this week, we have this video. Just substitute “ride a bike” for “be creative” or anything you want to do in life.