IN SEARCH OF LOST TIME: OUR SPARE TIME ISN’T SPARE – IT’S OPPORTUNITY TIME

“Spare Time” is a myth. It can lead to success, illustrated through stories of James Michener, Sylvester Stallone, Steve Jobs, and Sam Walton transforming opportunities into achievements.

Most people waste their spare moments.

Other people make fortunes in their spare time.

My friend says that every day is a fortune.  We both agreed that time is our only asset.

The famed American novelist James Michener began his writing career during World War II, – in his spare time – when as a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy he was assigned to the South Pacific ocean as a Naval historian.

He experienced many boring evening. And boring nights.

So he took notes. Notes of what he saw and whom he met.

After his discharge from service in the Navy he later turned his notes and impressions into Tales of the South Pacific – his first book – 1947.  It was published when he was age 40. The book later won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1948.  Rodgers and Hammerstein adapted it as the hit Broadway musical South Pacific.  

Michener went on to become a successful novelist with celebrity status and fortune. It started by him having not much more to do, other than taking notes in his spare time in the South Pacific islands.

Sylvester Stallone in 1970 was paid US$200 for two days’ work.   Stallone later explained that he lived a life of desperation after being evicted from his apartment and finding himself homeless for several days. In New York. He has also recounted how he slept three weeks in the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City.   On March 24, 1975, Stallone saw the Muhammad Ali vs. Chuck Wepner fight. That night Stallone went home. There at home, having nothing better to do he wrote the script for Rocky. After three days he had completed the first draft of Rocky. He decided that the script he wrote fits him and he wanted to play the role of Rocky in this film.

Stallone attempted to sell the script to multiple studios, with the intention of playing the lead role himself. Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff became interested and offered Stallone US$350,000 for the rights, but they had their own casting ideas for the lead role.

Stallone refused to sell the script unless he played the lead character – and, eventually, after a substantial budget cut to compromise, it was agreed he could be the star.

Prior to seeing the casting notice for the film, in the actor’s words, “it was either do that movie or rob someone, because I was at the end – the very end – of my rope”.

Sylvester Stallone didn’t have spare time.  He had the time and he put it to use.

He put his time to use. Next he went to fame and fortune from this low point of his life.

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Steve Jobs had an Apple, an iPhone and a “Big” Mac.  At age 56 he passed. He left behind $11 billion.

Every day is a fortune as long as one is alive. Most people waste their spare moments.

A similar story for Sam Walton.  Used to be the richest man on the planet.  At age 74 he left behind Sam’s Club and Wal-Mart.  

Every day was a fortune for Sam Walton, as long as he lived.

My point is that there is no spare time in life.  Time is the only asset that a person has.

Every moment is a fortune.

As they say in French:

A la recherché du temps perdu. (~ Marcel Proust).

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Tags: #SamWalton #SteveJobs #SylvesterStallone #JamesMichener #MarcelProust #RodgersandHammerstein #PulitzerPrize #TalesofSouthPacific #Rocky #Walmart #SamsClub