If you are ever paid to do something, you are a professional.
At least that’s my understanding of what it means to be a pro.
I’m a pro.
If the definition of “professional” that I found this morning holds true in all cases, I’m sure I fall a little short in some parts of the description.
Part of the definition is “exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace”.
Man….I guess I’m still a pro…I think I’m pretty consistent, but there have been times when I felt like losing it. Maybe “feeling like” and acting out are two different things.
If I’m to understand that payment equates with professionalism….then I guess that I’m a professional lobsterman, a carpenter and sanitation expert, nutritionist, nurseryman, mechanic, farmer, day care worker, landscaper, policeman, set designer, beer cart driver, warehouseman, bookstore worker and literary critic, engineer, disc jockey, hatchery worker, pizza chef, veterinary tech and …sanitation engineer, mailman, retail specialist, painter of refrigeration cases, painter of portraits, media specialist, counselor, driver, courier, movie critic, proofreader, musician…what else?
My resume is kind of disjointed.
If you include all the positions I’ve held that had non-monetary forms of payment, it opens up a lot more possibilities.
One of the ones that springs to mind most easily is PARENT.
I am a true professional in that capacity.
My wife and children can tell you that the part about courtesy always holds true when it comes to my parenting skills.
“Value added” is a term I hear thrown around a good deal, too.
I can’t think of anything that I have done in my life that has added value to it like marrying Jenny and starting our family together.
I don’t make any money being a husband and father… but I am paid.
Value has been added to my life because of what they have brought to it.
I am a professional…one in a line of successful acolytes…apprenticed to good people who did their best to be good to each other.
I hope that my children…after serving out their own version of an apprenticeship… get the chance to be professionals in their own time.