The Secret to Success by Eric Thomas Page B

preached, “We are only as strong as our weakest link.” He believed that all the great empires fell from the inside. I remember going to every meeting tense with knots in my stomach. You never knew what another one of your peers was going to say to you or someone else. The Lemon Squeeze sessions in my opinion were always dangerous. Personally, I had never been in a setting with my peers where we spoke so freely and honestly about other people’s flaws. Where I was from, if a person talked about someone like that, it was bound to turn into a knockdown, drag out fight. The only time anyone remotely addressed a brother’s weakness and it not turn into a fight was during a roasting session (playing the dozens). Even then if the person was not careful, it could go from a roast to a heavy weight prizefight. The rules were simple. The group would select one individual from the team to take 5 to 10 minutes sharing with a certain individual their opinion about what that person needed to work on over the next week. The team member who was critiqued was not allowed to rebut. After each member gave his remarks, the individual was then asked to explain how he could use the constructive criticism to elevate his personal and organizational game. The sessions always ended with group praise. Black believed the session should always end with the message that each individual was valued as a person and that all contributions to the organization were valued (hence the name Lemon Squeeze.) Our meetings started with constructive criticism (the individual getting squeezed) and ended with praise (adding the sugar to make lemonade). I am not sure which was more salient, the actual process or the things I learned about myself during each session. The process taught me the value of being proactive. Black realized he did not want to wait for personality differences or petty misunderstandings to erode our mission. He could cut it off before it gained any momentum. More importantly, I learned through the process that by decreasing your threats you simultaneously increase your growth and success.

CHAPTER
11
You should have put a ring on it.
    â€œOne half of me is yours, the other half yours-Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours, And so all yours!” -
William Shakespeare
    After my freshmen year I could truly say that college was everything that I heard it would be and even more of what I dreamt it would be. In fact, my grades were an indicator of just how much fun I had my freshmen year. I traveled more than I had ever traveled in my life and most of my travels were outside of the Midwest. I went as far as I could go and made it back in time for my Monday classes. We went to Nashville, Louisville, Knoxville, Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis and Miami. I took full advantage of the campus life. I went to every basketball game, played in every spades tournament, played in every intramural sporting event available, never said no to a bowling tournament and missed work as many days on the job as I could without losing my work study job. But nothing made my freshmen experience as memorable as the time I spent with De. We did not have her mother to contend with, I could see her everyday and we even had class together. Our love for each other grew on campus in a way I don’t think it could have grown in Detroit. For instance, at least the first two quarters, we would go to church together and some co-ed worship services together and in between classes we would walk through the campus and have worship together. One thing we did not have to worry about was De getting pregnant and having to leave college and go home. All the strict school rules helped us to take our relationship slow and focus on getting to know each other. Huntsville wasn’t a big city like Detroit so we spent the majority of our time walking, talking, studying, and getting to know each other on a deeper level.
    â€œI don’t want to grow up, ‘cause if I