I highly doubt Rudolph realized the inherent advice that he was giving. It’s the same advice I give college juniors and seniors who ask me how to build a successful business and the advice I give nascent auctioneers in the halls at conferences: “Focus on your core competencies. Find what you do best, and focus on the niche market that values that.” It’s advice I had to learn from experience.
Back at my hostel, folks asked where I’d been; and I told them.
Responses included, “They let you do that!?” and “How did you arrange that?”
“I asked.”
There are some big lessons in there for me—professional, relational, and spiritual ramifications that I’ve been processing since then. But on my first morning in Cape Town, I made the rest of the trip unnecessary. This would not be topped. This would be the story of the trip.
So, while I didn’t really need to learn Walter’s primary lesson, it was the “two” of the movie’s “one-two” educational punch that hit me so hard that I got emotional in the theater.