“I have to get this done by Thursday.”
“Why?”
“Because I told myself that’s when I’m going to finish.”
“Oh so you don’t really have to get it done by Thursday.”
The punchline here is that both of the voices are in your own head.
Being able to implement, respect and enforce your own deadlines, regardless of the absence of outside support, is a crucial factor to your road of success.
Transformation is rarely associated with efficiency.
Transformation is rarely sped up with more effort.
Transformation comes from experience.
Transformation happens to you and within you.
Like The Wallflowers sang, ‘man I ain’t changed but I know I ain’t the same’.
I don’t have a formula, but here’s a start…
Vision, desire, action, diligence. And keep your eyes open.
It’s hard to help someone and save them from drowning when they won’t stop flailing around.
No one wants to get near the flailer because it’s going to end up wearing both parties out.
It could be that you need help. It could be that you know you need help and so you’re running around as fast as you can. Flailing. Desperate. And unknowingly rejecting any possible help.
Refocus. Work your plan. Invite and accept the help you need.
How could you make it easier for people to help you?
The main reason why your fans relate to you, believe you, adopt your story is because of the consistency at which you tell it.
Say you’re an artist and you get a mohawk. If you have it for one day, that’s funny and cute. If you have it for ten years it’s a different thing. Because if I go and get a mohawk too, I like knowing that we’re both walking around with the same haircut (for the same reasons). And if someone makes fun of me, I find solace that you’d be on my side.
And of course the mohawk could be anything.
Any well known band or artist became that way because of their commitment to consistency.
Lady Gaga, U2, Prince, Beyonce, Madonna, Coldplay.
»» Yes, with all of these artists we could talk about their ‘reinventions’ throughout their careers, but I think we’d find more consistency of purpose, character and spirit than we would new-ness.
Remember when we got high on the tunes
Yeah maybe we needed the next and the new
As much as we needed to work and get better
But maybe we just loved the music so it didn’t really matter
Call it a good one, a great one, a hit
A scratch demo or version three with a little something to fix
We couldn’t believe what was coming out of the speakers
And we believed in all of our hearts that the people would see us
Playing on a stage with a million lights
With a million fans right by our side
So when the curtain went up till the curtain came down
We were high on the tunes, high on that sound
The kicks and the snares and the vocals and bass
The guitars and the synths and the verbs and delays
We were high on the tunes, we were totally gone
More days a week than we weren’t with those songs
All over the country, all over the world
Selling our stash and praying we got heard
Cause those who would listen just might hear like we did
And share in that buzz and want it again
Yeah high on the tunes because we were young
Because we were young we couldn’t know what we’d done
But held together with some songs and the truth
Remember when we got high on the tunes
»» This is certainly not my typical post. So perhaps a little look behind the curtain is in order…
As I was walking out of Ace Hardware this morning, the first line popped into my head. I had a little time to kill so I got my phone out and typed it in a note. When I got to the end of the line, the beginning of the next line came…and that’s how it went for about five minutes till I was finished. I didn’t expect it. I didn’t know what it was going to be about. I didn’t know how long or short it was going to go.
Even though I didn’t expect it, I was willing.
Even though I didn’t know what it was going to be about, the willingness and ownership caused it to quickly turn into something that matters to me.
Even though I didn’t know how long it would go, it turned out to be the proper length.
But the real key is the age old advice, just start. You can’t know what will happen after you start typing until you start typing.
It’s easy to let your incredible work ethic justify your bitterness of not having the thing that you hoped for.
Working our hardest and giving our best on a consistent basis…we all want and expect that to be enough to carry us through the goal line.
But it often isn’t. So resentment and bitterness set in…ever so subtly. What’s my problem? What’s their problem? I work just as hard as that other person and I don’t have what they have! And I want what they have and I’m working my hardest, so if working my hardest isn’t enough then that means I’m not enough!
We get confused about the purpose of the work. We get confused about what a goal is for and what it isn’t for. We overlay our identity on top of the results of our work and so we mistake ourselves for our work.