Can you imagine if Donald Trump decided to become a beautician or a chef? How about your local law enforcement officer as a ballerina or even Tiger Woods as a shoe salesman? Clearly, Mr. Trump and Mr. Woods (for example) know which ideas to nurture and which to avoid; regardless of how sane or wild those ideas appeared to others (well O.K., there was that president option). Perhaps you even have a wild idea for a career you’ve yet to embark upon. When beginning our journey towards excellence, a solid first step forward often takes us one step back to our childhood where much of what we understood about ourselves came through the words of our early care providers.
As we grew we began to discover for ourselves (and through the voices of others) what we excelled at and what, quite frankly, we did not. For example, I suck (technical term) at algebra. It took three attempts to finally get a C- so I could move towards my bachelor’s degree. However, I am in my zone when I’m blessed to be speaking to groups of individuals. Whether sharing knowledge around leadership, team building, communication, or simply motivating others though public speaking, I am closest to my life’s passion when on a stage speaking. Although public speaking consistently ranks near the fear of death for most people, it’s not generally problematic for me. In truth, it actually energizes me and “floats my boat” as they say. By concentrating on how to best serve audience members, there is no time to focus on what individual participants will think about me.
I’m further buoyed by the words of my friend, Willie Jolley, a fellow motivational speaker who says, out of ten audience members, three will like me because I’m there, three because of what I say, and three because of the way I say it. However, one audience member (or blog reader in this case) is not going to like me no matter what I say or write – so what! I’m neither talking to that one person nor did I write this blog for them.
Isn’t life just like that though? Isn’t there always that one person you cannot please no matter how good you are at what you do? It’s at times like that you have got to manifest a “so what” attitude. Always remember you are not moving towards your excellence zone or sharing your gifts and talents to please naysayers, you are doing so because YOU must and because those other nine people need what YOU have! So never allow that one naysayer to distract you from executing what makes your heart sing or what your follower’s require.
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