GLIMPSES
Part I-"The Variety of Life"

Part II-"The Demon 
in the Mirror"

Part III-"The Source of the 
Image in the Mirror"

Part IV - "More on being 
salesperson"

Part V - "Greetings, Fellow Salespeople"

Click here for 
More Glimpses 
from Harley

Glimpses

(written by Harley Castleberry)

In one of my articles I mentioned, in general terms, several things that I have experienced in my life.  I have been encouraged to relate the specifics of some of those events.  Let me make something clear at the beginning:  I am no one special.  I do not feel that I have any experiences that are not common to all of us.  Possibly, where I may be a little bit different is that I am willing to openly share these things.  The reason being, that if I do not try to leave some kind of trail, many others who will follow will think they have been “singled out” to endure or overcome some unexpected obstacle in their road.  If I don’t try to leave some sort of insight or triumph for others, the Devil has won!  Then no one will know that there are ways to get around his best obstacles.  My methods of licking the Devil may not always be the best, but they are one way, and from a faint ray of hope, others may find a dozen other ways to triumph over adversity.  Never, never forget that God is the giver of every good and perfect gift.  Why do bad things happen to us?  It is because each of us has an enemy that delights in sucking the very joy of life out of us.  There are none that are not his targets.  We are sons and daughters of the most high God, and joint heirs (did you get that? – joint heirs!) with his royal Son, Jesus Christ.  “Only the best” – that’s what he desires for all of us.

I think that the logical place to begin is near the beginning.  I grew up on the opposite side of the block from the First Baptist Church where my parents were married, saved and were members.  I can honestly say that I can’t remember when I didn’t know there was God.  I was a long way from understanding much about Him, but even now, years later, I’m still a babe in really knowing, and understanding my Heavenly Father.  “My ways are not your ways” He tells us.  Still He loves us with a love that cost His only son His life in order to draw us to Him for all eternity.

After starting to school, much to my dismay, I found out that my birth date did not meet the criteria of the Baptist Sunday School Board in Nashville, Tennessee.  The way my birthday fell on the calendar relegated me to be in a Sunday school class with kids one year behind me in school.  At that point in life, one year made a lot of difference in whom your friends were and who you associated with.  No exceptions!  This dividing line concerning ages was unchangeable.  Nashville had spoken.  My mother went to bat for me several times but “rules are rules.”  When my brother and sister (twins) were born, continuity in Sunday school attendance was broken.  This was when folks washed, dried (on outdoor clotheslines) and folded diapers.  Some of you will recall the old ringer washing machines and two galvanized tubs – one for bluing and one for rinse water.
By the time that I entered high school, some of my classmates would occasionally talk me into attending Sunday school with them.  I was definitely out of the habit.  We (they) had a good boys teacher and in fact he worked at my dad’s lumber yard.  I also worked there.  It seemed that every time I accepted one of those invitations, Arnold would ask me to lead in a closing prayer.  It probably wasn’t every time but I dreaded the end of the class period because I felt that I had a large target visible somewhere on my body.  When called upon to pray, I was scared to death!  At that point in my life, I really didn’t know what to pray about.  I hated that!  There was a very slim chance of talking me into attending two times in a row.  I needed time to heal.  At some point, God evidently called Nashville and told them to get that birth date problem solved!
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We’ve grown up hearing how good looking we are; from “pretty baby” through “beautiful young lady” or “fine looking lad.”  If the truth be known, only our parents and grandparents thought we were beautiful at birth.  Other well-wishers who visited, secretly thought “looks like a wrinkled little old man,” regardless of our gender.  And then, we start to school…

All of an individual’s lights don’t come on until about age 30.  Prior to that, our memory recorders sputter and flash with bits and pieces of data in slowly increasing quantity.  Take for instance that memory clip in the first grade when a small piece of reality hit you like a fly swatter across the face!  Seated across the table from you is a girl who is somehow different.  You like looking at her, until she turns her eyes toward you.  Quickly, you look away!  Something different there – she’s not like your sister, but still… she’s a girl.  And then she screams, “Carson, quit looking at me, you big eared dope!”  Your sister had often called you a “dope,” but big eared?  As soon as you get home, you bypass the refrigerator and head for a mirror. “Great bags of baloney!  She’s right!  My ears do look kind of big for my head.”   Meet the Demon in the mirror!

Before mirrors, early man would occasionally get a glimpse of his image in the water of a stream, or the rippled surface of a pond.  Everyone then thought that they looked like a mass of semi-jelled Jello-O.  No one would have been offended if you called them “fluid face, or ripple head.”  The early Egyptians improved on things by using polished brass plates for mirrors, and almost immediately dissatisfaction with natural looks gave way to vanity.  Gobs and gobs of vanity!

I’ve done my share of self-analysis in front of our old built-in medicine cabinet mirror.  The ears were a problem, but luckily I spotted that myself.  And then my hair didn’t meet my expectations.  I would have been happier had it been coal black like my dad’s.  As I grew a little older, I discovered a horrifying fact!  I was going to develop the dreaded “Castleberry Nose!”  Imagine a honker like that on a little, big-eared kid.  All my classmates looked normal.  The Demon had introduced me to THE GREAT COMPARISON GAME OF LIFE.

Our lives, directly and indirectly, are fixated daily on “looks.”  It’s thrown in our face in newspaper ads, television ads, and programs, displays, and posters in stores, beauty contests, and clothing design.  For most of our lives we feel compelled to try to look like someone that we’re not!  This fashion model uses “Fling-On” makeup – shouldn’t you?  “Men, for success in your life, use Gray Away.”  The Demon in the mirror has convinced us that God made some serious mistakes in our design.

And tragically, most of us still participate, at least in part, in THE GREAT COMPARISON GAME OF LIFE.  The really unfortunate think the game is real, and have come to hate themselves.  Countless people, of all ages, have never come to accept themselves for who they really are.  Admittedly, it took me a long, long time to fully accept me for who I am.  The things that I’m not cut out for, I’ll never be held accountable for!  I’ll never be a pianist, mathematician, or a great…   anything!  My hair will never be black, or wavy, I’ll always peer out over this large but serviceable nose and I’ll probably always have a sense of humor; no matter how embarrassing that was to my dad as I was growing up.  (In later years I found out that he too had a repressed sense of humor, and we enjoyed one another.)

I never really started to live without the shackles of the Mirror Demon until I ran the demon off, and started living MY life.  The list of things that I am not, nor will ever be, could fill a book, but gifts that God saw fit to pass on to me, and the multiple talents with which I am blessed, are more than enough to cause me to drop out of the comparison game and ENJOY me, fearfully and wonderfully made:

Refresher course:

1. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are they works; and that my soul knoweth right well.  (Psalms 139:14) 

2. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them.  (Genesis 1:27)

Before getting uptight about whom we wish we were, what we wish we could do, or what we wish we looked like, reread 1, and 2, above.  God does not make mistakes!  Maybe, we just need to put more effort into who we are. 

The “SOURCE!”  Now therein, is the root of my problem!  The difficulty is not really the image in the mirror, but the source of that image.  That image-projecting “source” is an individual who has proven to be the most difficult person to get acquainted with that I have ever encountered.  He is often critical, has unrealistic ideals and standards, is picky, creative, talented, often led by conscience, and on top of all that, sometimes doesn’t even understand how he is wired up himself!  The only real hope that I hold out for him is the fact that God is not through with him yet!

Take for example the time when he ( I ) was twelve years old.  After meeting the person from whom my first name was derived, I’ll have to admit that I was a bit, shall we say, “under whelmed.”  He was a cousin of my mother’s and lived in California.  He was quite talented, but spoiled by his mother as a child, after his dad passed away unexpectedly.  I don’t know that he ever held a steady job, but even as an adult, he lived with his mother and stepfather and did pretty much as he pleased on a daily basis.  The story is that both my mother and father liked the name and so I became “Harley.”  You can bet that was before my dad met the California Harley.  Had that meeting occurred twelve years earlier, I doubt that I would be carrying that name today, even though I never heard my dad express any negative feelings about the matter.  Believe me, among other things, my dad did have a work ethic that was so strong it carried over into the makeup of all three of his children.  It was almost like being inoculated.

Even people on the other side of the earth recognize the name “Harley-Davidson.”  Most knowledgeable people recognize their product as being the true “king of beasts.”  But somehow, the “Harley” in my name has been an extremely confusing moniker, even to highly educated college professors.  When the class role was called, the verification of my attendance was often sought with names such as, “Harvey” Castleberry, “Harold,” or “Horace.”  How is it that my name confounded even the most learned?  Years and years later as I worked as a residential real estate appraiser in the Dallas Metroplex, I was sometimes called “other” names that made Harvey, Harold and Horace seem quite acceptable. We will not delve into those names any further – at least not at this time.

Fast forward to age twenty:  I couldn’t help but notice her in the choir at the church I was visiting, and after the services had dismissed I found her in the crowd, introduced myself as “Glenn,” my middle name, and asked her for a date.  Surprisingly, to both of us I think, she said yes, and I was on the threshold of turning the corner on this confusing first name of mine.  This time we’d start off right with not even a shadow of name confusion.  I had become GLENN!  I was a new man!

Martha and I dated a few times but unfortunately things didn’t go all that well.  Apparently she had never dated anyone who was off in never-never-land, because she rather frequently found it necessary to make more than one attempt to get my attention.  Actually, I was not afflicted with memory lapses or day dreaming, but a large majority of the time I had no idea who she was talking to.  She kept calling me “Glenn.”  Martha was a really neat girl and I regret pulling her into the experimental name change laboratory, but my brief experience with her cured me.  I have been “Harley” ever since – with no complaints!.

If an individual has any self-respect, determining what kind of person one hopes to be, and building personal character on that basis, is not an easy job.  Building individual character is a serious, long term, construction project.  To some extent, I suspect it may take a lifetime, but like building a stone wall, we build it one stone at a time.  At age eighteen I became acquainted with a couple that sponsored our training union class at church.  They were a real source of influence in my life.  I visited with them about a month ago, fifty-one years later, at a church reunion and they are still a source of inspiration.  As a teenager I clearly recall two things they said that made enough sense in my young mind to make them a part of my value system.  One was:  “Don’t date anyone that you wouldn’t marry.”  The differences in faith and backgrounds could contain many pitfalls.  The other bit of wisdom was:  “You must stand for something, or you’ll fall for anything.”  A person without convictions is a person living in mire with the backbone of a wet sock.  (Both elaborations are by yours truly.)

Let me ask you “Are you a salesperson?”  Have you ever worked in a store?  Have you worked on commission?  (HINT!  The answer to the original question is YES.)

Sounding a bit like the opening of a Lone Ranger episode, “Let’s return to the thrilling days of yesteryear!”  Let’s return to our school days.  Stay with me on this.  Think back.  Find that person, whom at sometime in the past, you secretly idolized.  What was it about them?  Their stature, mannerisms, hairstyle, abilities, humor, popularity, good looks, or leadership qualities?  You’ve probably locked in on that individual already, but if you need a little more time, think it through.  This can be important.  You’re coming out of a deep sleep.  You’re becoming more conscious.  When you open your eyes you will be very relaxed and will remember vividly the person you at one time idolized.  “Open your eyes.”  Now ask yourself – “Did that person ever know that you idealized them?  Did they even know who you were?  Ever try to mimic their magic quality in your own life? 

Have you ever given any thought that others, through the years, may have been watching you and idolizing some quality that you projected?  It has probably happened.  Most likely it has happened and you never knew it.  Oh, and you were so modest!  You are not a sales person!  We are all salespeople!  Others observe and hear our sales pitches constantly.  What part of our character are we selling to our spouses, our children, our friends and the strangers that we come in contact with?  We are charged with letting our lights so shine that others can see Christ in us!  Our routine lives are a daily witness that can affect the eternal future of others.

Welcome to the world’s largest salesmanship club! 

Don’t think for a minute that we are through with this salesmanship issue – ‘cause we’re not! 
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The old farmer took the stranger out to the lot to let him look at the cow.  The stranger carefully checked out the black and white milk cow.

“She give good milk?”

“Oh yes,” drawled the farmer, “and lots of it.”

“She looks healthy.”

“Yep.  Never had a vet bill on the old girl.”

“Your ad said you wanted $15.00 for her.  What’s the catch?”

“There’s no catch.  First $15.00 takes her.”

“Why on earth would you sell a perfectly good cow for such a cheap price?”

The old farmer paused for a moment and replied, “The only bad thing that I know about her is that she just don’t look good.”

“The stranger quickly pulled out $15.00 and said, “Well she looks plenty good to me.  I’ll take her.”

A couple of days passed and the stranger was knocking on the old farmer’s door with a sense of urgency.  When the door opened the stranger snapped, “You’ve cheated me!  I want my money back and you can have your old cow.”

Calmly, the farmer inquired, “What seems to be the problem?”

“That animal is as blind as a bat!” the frustrated new owner yelled.

“Now settle down young feller.  I didn’t cheat you.  I clearly remember telling you that the only thing bad about her was that she don’t look good.”
 

It is this type of salesmanship that gives salespeople a bad name.  Greed from a profit or a commission drives many people in our world.  It’s not necessary to actually be selling a product to become infected by greed.  The motivations and techniques are limitless, but in the end, none of the players will ride to the cemetery in a hearse pulling a trailer loaded with their wealth.

A very wealthy man had passed away and his attorney was asked confidentially, “How much did he leave?”

“All of it.” came the reply.

Unfortunately, that’s not the end payoff of unethical practices.  We will all stand before “the Judge” and give an accounting of ourselves.

“We are all salespeople.” I proclaimed in the last episode.  Some may declare, “I AM NOT a salesperson!  I hate salesmen!”  O.K., O.K!  I didn’t say that you were a good salesman!

Let’s take a quick mental trip back to our childhood, when some organization that we were connected with had a fund raiser that required us to sell candy, magazines, cookies, or whatever.  Wasn’t that fun?  NO!  That was not fun.  Getting doors slammed in your face is not fun.  Having people tell you “No” is no fun.  Those adults who sent us out would most likely not have had any fun either, if we could have reversed the roles.  “Tell them who you are and that you are helping raise funds so that your school class can get a Sales Plaque.”  (Yeah, that aught to do it.) 

If you have children, or have ever been a child, you know that kids learn early on how to work one parent against the other, to meet the child’s desired goal.  That’s a form of salesmanship.  Just as that is a natural trait, we all use a variety of techniques throughout life to hopefully bring about the desired result.  Just last week my wife said, “You really look nice when you wear a tie.”  (Sell, sell.)  Counteracting this sales approach for the umpteenth time since I retired, I smilingly replied, “But no one is going to see it when they lower the lid for the last time.”  It is my contention that a “neck rag” is one of the most useless pieces of attire that a man can wear.  And, being a Texan, to me it is a constant reminder of the days of old, when a man could have something tied around his neck and hanged until dead!

Contrary to popular belief, there are some good salesmen.  They place the needs and concerns of the customer, or client, ahead of their desire to make a sale.  If a salesman cannot do that, he is selling the wrong product or needs to expand his skills.  By the time our third son was in the formative years, I had learned a little bit on the parental combat front.  Getting any child to clean his room, take out the trash or similar minor tasks frequently generated responses more befitting assigning them the unthinkable tasks of eating all their vegetables or sit by a “girl” in a school production.  From a little sales training, I learned that the client, or customer, needs to be given choices.  Don’t try to thrust a single product on them.  This tidbit of common sense changed the acceptance of task assignments for our youngest.  It was foregone knowledge that he wouldn’t want to do either thing, but when I said, “David, today you need to clean up your room or mow the lawn.  Which had you rather do?”  After a brief period of reflection, he would reply, “I think that I had rather mow the lawn.”  No complaints followed, because HE made the decision.  And either way, as a parent I won.  A good transaction is when all parties feel that they made a good deal.

I have had the opportunity, in the company where I worked, to address groups of new hires following college job fairs.  Fresh out of school and smelling like fresh diplomas, I welcomed them to a new world where all their years of schooling will not mean success and happiness, if they have not learned how to effectively, persuasively and convincingly 
present their thoughts and ideas to management.  Subconsciously all of us require being “sold” before we make any kind of important decision and that requires a “salesperson” to change the course of events.  While this is vividly evident throughout recorded history, it is still an effective and important ingredient in advertising, business and at home where the lives of future leaders are being molded.  Positive persuasion accomplishes what wars cannot. 

You may have noticed, I’ve been selling you on the idea that whether you are a good salesperson or a bad one, you make an impact – either positively, or negatively.  A summary of our sales records will be read at the bar of judgment when we finish our course.  Grades will be posted for all to see. 

The greatest “product” in the world is Jesus Christ, bringing God’s grace and forgiveness to a world that deserves none of the three.  The very lives that we live are a witness to all with whom we come in contact.  How is your sales record coming along? 
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I had been selling securities for a short period of time when my manager asked me to accompany him on a sales call.  A lady, who owned a busy beauty shop, and her husband, were customers of Mark’s.  We stopped at the receptionist’s desk and Mark asked for the owner.  Mark seemed to know the receptionist, but I couldn’t tell for sure – he treated everyone as if he knew them.  As we waited for the lady to come to the office, Mark commented to the receptionist how nice her hair looked.  They visited briefly and Mark obtained an appointment to personally meet with her and her husband.

As we left the building and were crossing Belt Line Road, he asked, “Did you see what I did back there?”  I responded, “Yeah, you gave that lady a snow job about her hair and got an appointment.  “Wait a minute!” he said, grabbing my upper arm, and stopped me on the center line of the two lane street.  “Did her hair look nice or not?”  Replaying the scenes of the last few minutes in my mind, I had to admit, “Yes, her hair did look nice.”  As we proceeded to the other side of the street, he continued, “I paid her a legitimate compliment.  Did you notice how her face lit up?”  I concurred.  “Find something to compliment people about.  No one ever gets tired of being complimented.  BUT don’t give false compliments.  People are not dumb – they know when that happens, and you immediately lose credibility.”

I never forgot that.  Mark was a psychology major, and he sure knew people and how to deal with them.  I learned a lot by observing Mark and how he chose words that not only carefully conveyed his thoughts, but also used words in a manner to guide a thought process, or bring about a desired response.  I’ll have to admit however, that some of his methods I could never use.  Not that they were crooked or unethical, they just fit Mark’s personality and style – not mine.  As we mature to the point that we’re not trying to be all things to all people, we finally have to get down to who we are as individuals, and the parameters on which our character will evolve and mature.

Mark was very, very successful; loved selling and loved to observe those qualities in others.  One day he went to an automobile dealership for the purpose of purchasing a new Lincoln.  The car salesman had no idea that his skills were being scrutinized.  Mark became disgusted by the lack of enthusiasm and sales ability of the man.  He left there and went directly to a Cadillac dealership and bought a Cadillac!  I asked, “If you wanted a Lincoln, why didn’t you buy a Lincoln?”  He purchased his second choice because, “That guy at the Lincoln dealership was no salesman!  I gave him a chance.”

Several years later I stopped at a little service station near my home for gas.  This was about a twice-weekly routine, but on this occasion the cashier that I was accustomed to seeing was no longer there and the replacement, a woman probably in her mid to late thirties, displayed no personality at all.  On top of that, she had been severely shortchanged on feminine beauty.  An old friend of mine would have stated matter-of-factly “She looked like a bucket of warts.”  I lay no claim on that statement and stick by my opinion that the poor woman had been cheated, badly, in some areas of appearance.  Several weeks went by and if ANY minor verbal exchange occurred between the two of us, it was because I initiated it.  We’re talking minimal basics, like my saying, “Good morning.” and “Thank you.”  Remembering that mid road experience from the past, I kept trying to find something to compliment her on.  I frankly wasn’t that smart.  I decided that I would see if any dialog occurred during my transactions if I kept my mouth shut, and didn’t attempt any conversation.  My plan, though leaving me feeling unnatural, proved to be correct.  Tank after tank of gas and she would write up the ticket, run it through the credit card imprinter, return my card, and shove the ticket forward for me to sign.  Like Santa going about his work, as related in the poem, he (she) said not a word. 

After several weeks of the two of us casually looking at one another during my purchases, I noticed something.  BINGO!  We’ve got a winner!  As she wrote out my ticket, I noticed that she had pretty hands, slender, straight fingers with well-groomed, polished nails.  “This is it!  I’m going to give it my best shot.” I thought.  “You have very pretty hands.” I commented.  As if the spring rains came fourth, then the warm sun broke through, suddenly she was smiling.  “Why thank you”, she said, continuing to maintain that smile.

From that day forward, when I walked into that office, her face lit up as we made eye contact.  The exchange of pleasantries that one normally experiences in most every place of business, immediately started to occur when I walked into that little gas station. 

Each of us has the ability to influence those around us, either positively or negatively.  We cannot make “invisible” contacts with others – we make some kind of impression.  Something as simple as one genuine compliment can enrich the lives of two people, the giver and the receiver.  After all, “selling” salt and light doesn’t have to be complicated. 

We give a witness just by being ourselves.

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