July is a great time to reflect on opportunities and success - by Mark Schnurman

Commercial Real Estate rocks! It is an awesome way to make a living and create positive change in the lives of people and New York City. While it is not always easy, our industry affords opportunities and challenges like no other.

As I write this on the eve of America’s Independence Day, the healthcare debate is raging, I am reminded that nothing in life is a right or guaranteed. There are no entitlements in life. 

Sure, the Constitution grants us life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness but it does not ensure us food, shelter or anything else. All the Constitution really provides is opportunity and that is all any of us really need.

Everything we achieve in life we earn by taking advantage of the opportunities afforded us. Yes, some people are more fortunate than others because they have more opportunities but, by and large, anyone with a dream and drive can succeed in our business.

I am an excitable, enthusiastic and energetic guy driven to alliteration. I thank my lucky stars every day that I was born in the United Sates in the last third of the 20th Century. I realize that living in America is a privilege and being born a U.S. citizen is a fortunate accident. I view working in NYC as a privilege. I view being in commercial real estate as a privilege. I view working at Eastern Consolidated with great people as a privilege. 

So I am a person of privilege because of the opportunities provided to me. I am a product of the public education system and attended large state universities for college and graduate school. 

I did not have the advantage of growing up in an affluent family wrought with connections. Nor did I attend elite private schools. But that did not limit my opportunites– it only made me have to work a little harder to find them. 

I was not born into a NYC real estate family. Instead, I have amazing parents who always instilled in me the confidence and belief that I could accomplish anything I set my mind to. Is there anything more a parent can provide a child than belief?

Life is not what happens to you but what you do with it. I pinch myself every day to be doing what I do. I GET to work with amazing people. I GET to help others succeed. I GET to provide for my family. I GET to have fun. I GET to build something.

Every night when I go to sleep I thank the Gods that there is America and that I was born here. There is a lot of noise out there but we live in a perfect country, the greatest the world has and will ever see!

Mark Schnurman is chief sales officer, principal at Eastern Consolidated, New York, N.Y.