During the past weekend my company has exhibited our products at the Whole Life Expo in Toronto. This event, with such long history has been normally well attended, but for last two years it seems to be going through some difficulties due to the side effects of the US Thanksgiving. The process is simple. For years Canadians were traveling to the US to take advantage of their huge specials during the Black Friday event. Canadian big stores, companies and malls in their pursue to keep clientele in the country, adopted the idea of great specials, so Canadians will stay and shop within their own country. As a consequence of this, people are running for massive specials in the stores around the city and do not attend events, which focus more on education and offering a “small niche” products. That is what happened to Whole Life Expo.

As much as I understand people wanting to buy everything cheaper, I, my company and other smaller businesses are hurt in the process. Having a positive attitude toward the event, we came filled with hopes that those who are truly interested will come anyway. And they did. Not as many as we experienced throughout past years, but they did. I have also decided not to close each financial day separately, but rather focus on service instead.

My focus was on what I can do to maintain that positivity for the weekend. Help came, as usual in my case, from the past. I was pondering upon the problem and thought about how the wise people in the ancient times would approach a situation like that. Succor came from philosopher Seneca. He said once: “If you want to live for yourself, live for others”. How brilliant!

Throughout the entire weekend we were talking to clients, having more time for each of them, and focusing on delivering as much education as possible. It often looked almost like a mini workshops, when one person asked a questions, we took time to do small presentations, which in turn, attracted more people to watch and attend. Not that it brought much more sells, but at least we had a satisfaction from time not wasted.

It also brought me to thinking how often are we are aware of that simple truth that the only way we fully and completely carried out by our service to others. I was writing some time ago about the word “minister” meaning servant hence suppose to provide service and be of service instead of taking advantage of the position. This past weekend I have truly and fully experienced what that means and how it feels to be focused on being of service regardless of what. Because this experiment took three days, it becomes even more distinct and memorable. We have met on Monday talking about it for quite a while, having fun sharing the most special moments and conversations with clients.

It turned out to be quite special three days. Sells weren’t overwhelmingly great, but we got many new clients, friends and were able to attract new people to the world of dowsing. Most importantly – we feel great!