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The fifth in a daily series — Esquire's historic collection of wisdom from the 111th Congress...

My dad just imprinted in my mind from a very young age that you always do what you say you're gonna do when you say you're gonna do it.

I started working when I was 13, picking up trash, bagging ice. I worked at Western Auto, became a construction laborer. I had no thoughts about public life as a young person. Well, I was president of student body in high school, I will say that, but I didn't campaign for the job. I just woke up one day and I was president.

I saved $8,000 and created a construction company when I was 25. The company grew at 80 percent a year to 18 different states. We did things in slightly different ways, and I think that experience created a confidence in my ability to think outside-the-box and execute.

The definition of power can be very different depending on the situation you're in. As the mayor of a community, power means you have the ability to convene. In Chattanooga, I had the ability to create a vision, to put the pieces in place to make that vision a reality and to influence others toward that end by explaining with passion why that was the right direction to go. In the Senate, power is different. Of course, committee leaderships certainly give someone the ability to convene. But in the Senate, power is more about understanding issues in such a way that you have the ability to influence others' thinking. There are a hundred folks in the Senate and you have just one vote, but if you develop an understanding of an issue, you have the ability to influence thinking in a way that can create critical mass so that people end up moving policy-wise in the direction that you'd like them to go.

The Senate can be a semi-frustrating place for a guy like me. I like to build and develop. I'm a lawmaker, but I really don't like laws. What I like is creating an environment where people can flourish.

There are so many people who are creative, but can't follow through with actions that cause their creative thoughts to become a reality.

I bumped into this person who's deceased now, Jim Rouse, and he had a tremendous influence on me. He was interested in housing for low-income citizens. So he went out, bought thousands of acres, and built a city in Columbia, Maryland. He told me that you can have a vision that's not very bold and you can achieve it. But then you probably haven't achieved what you could. If you have a huge vision of the way things ought to be, even if you only get eighty percent of the way there, you've done so much more.

There's a confidence that comes with, over and over again, saying you're going to do something, taking steps, and then doing it. It emboldens you.

There's plenty of blame to go around. But you cannot solve a problem that is leading to a crisis by pointing fingers. When I had a major problem at my company — an ox in the ditch, if you will — casting blame was not useful. Solving the problem was useful.

I live in an old, old home that was built back in the early 1900s. It has a little land around it and a back porch that's a great place to sit and talk. I've found that drinking a glass of wine out there with someone allows them to share things with you more openly than they otherwise might.

I would get very, very nervous during debates. But over time you become accustomed to public speaking. You realize it's just like talking over the telephone.

Ahhhh, my guys are calling me. I gotta go do something else, but I'm sure it won't be near as much fun as talking to you.