Whether you’re just starting out or rethinking your current situation, you’re in charge of you. Where you go from here is largely related to who you are, how hard you’re willing to work and what kind of impact you want to make in the world. Choose to be amazing.
Early in my career a mentor helped me see that I had a choice in how I worked my way through life. He said that though I’d never be able to control every aspect of what happened, I could control how I showed up, what kind of impact I had and how I felt about that impact.
I’ve collected the best advice I’ve received over the years and narrowed them down to the top ten. I’d love to hear what works for you.
1. Be YOU
Much of the world doesn’t like originals. They like things and people that are predictable. But you have a choice in the kind of life you want to live. I love Todd Henry’s statement that “cover bands don’t change the world.” They play someone else’s music over and over again. Don’t be a cover band. Be you.
2. Have big goals
Be willing to aim for lofty goals, so that even if you fall short you will have accomplished something and that something is relevant to you. Long-term goals help you have an idea of the smaller steps you need to take to reach them. If you’re focused only on today, you become very fragile when things don’t go your way. Things are going to be different than what you planned. You should plan on that!
3. Make a difference
Plan to make a difference, to learn and grow and change the world. Those things don’t happen overnight. They aren’t killed overnight, either.
I encourage people to take a moment each quarter and document what they did over the previous three months to have an impact. A lot of people struggle with that. They can tell me all the work they did, or number of projects or clients, or places they went. But not anything of significance. Don’t confuse effort with outcome. Plenty of people work very hard and have nothing of significance to show for it.
4. Worry about what you can control; not about what you can’t.
This was something I heard early in my career and is absolutely one of the most important lessons of my life. Obsess over things under your control but learn to give up the things outside of your control.
You can’t control how your presentation will be received by the people you present to, but you can control how much time, energy, thinking and general preparation you put into your presentation. I’ve found that when I did the heavy lifting on my end more often than not the outcomes came closer to what I had hoped. It’s when I cheated on the prep that things went badly.
5. Take what you do seriously, but not yourself
Learn to laugh. Enjoy your work and the people around you. Nobody wants to work around the office curmudgeon and they certainly won’t be around to help make your life better if you’ve made theirs a personal hell. Do great work but enjoy the ride.
6. Be curious
Stay open to what’s new and different and crazy and special. Stop trying to know the approach. There is no one approach. That’s a fixed mindset that says somehow you’ve arrived and now you can’t grow any further. Science proves that your brain can rewire itself continuously and learn new techniques. So keep up the curiosity.
7. Be amazing at something
Don’t be normal. Normal is boring and doesn’t leave a mark. Be amazing. It doesn’t matter what you choose. Find your passion and work like crazy to be amazing.
8. Be willing to fail
I guess I’m lucky here, because failing comes so naturally to me or because I’m willing to put ideas out there and get a reaction. A few years after college I was on stage one night playing my guitar and singing before several hundred people and forgot the second verse to a song. Oh sure, I had the guitar chords down, but the lyrics were gone. I could have walked off the stage embarrassed or I could have … yeah, walking off wasn’t an option. I asked the audience if they’d mind me singing a different song. They didn’t mind. I played, sang and finished the song in style. I’m convinced the big applause I received wasn’t so much because I did anything special but because I had just overcome one of the top nightmares for people performing in front of an audience. I think they liked knowing I didn’t spontaneously combust. I’ve performed thousands of times since then and had any number of issues pop up. But I’ve always survived.
9. Don’t make excuses
Good things happen every day. Bad things happen every day. Own your issues and improve when you screw up. You will screw up. Hopefully, because you’re going to be willing to fail and that means you’ll miss the mark sometimes. When that happens, be the adult in the room who takes the heat.
10. Be open to change
What I do now didn’t exist five and ten years ago. Technology I use every hour didn’t exist three years ago. It’s an amazing time to be alive. Go with it. Learn new things. Be curious. Have a growth mindset and enjoy the ride.
BONUS: Who you are is not who you will become
Take a good look in the mirror. Whether you love or hate what you see, you have a chance to make tomorrow something special. You’re not stuck. If today was lousy, make tomorrow better. You can control that. You should control that. In the end, be you. Be amazingly you. And change the world while you’re at it.