A high school friend of mine used to always claim that he's the centre of the Universe.  I always would tease him for being cocky and arrogant.

But, you know, he is right.

From his perspective, he is the centre of the Universe.  From my perspective, I am.  From yours, you are.

That is not to say that my friend is the absolute most important person in the Universe to me or to you or to the rest of the world other than him.  To him however, he certainly is and should be the most important person.

When you can say, without feeling guilty of being arrogant, that you are the most important person in the Universe, then you are one step ahead. Truth is, you have to take care of yourself first before you can hope to take care of others.  This is "self first", not "selfish".  Your intention is fully to be strong so that you can touch others in some way, small or big.

You can replace the term "take care of" with "standing up for" (you have to stand up for yourself before you can hope to stand up for others) or "fight for" or "lead" or "manage" or "inspire" or "train" or "coach" or whatever other positive verbal phrase that is important to your career and your life.

Being strong means that at all times, you must be able to defend your decisions. What if one of your decisions turns out to be wrong? You must still defend it, because at the time of making the decision you had worked out in your mind a reasoning why you chose the particular path. This reasoning is the best defense because you convinced the most important person that it was right.

Some might be tempted to say that this is rationalization, but it is not. Rationalization is making up reasons after the fact to justify an incorrect decision.

The important implication of always being able to defend your decisions is that you must always make decisions that you can defend.

So, to that University of Waterloo co-operative education coordinator, who once told me "you Engineers, all you think about is me, me, me", in response to my refusal to work for a particular company for a second co-op term back in my student days: yes, you are right, it is about me first! 

by John E. Tran