I received an email from a Path student. It was a link to a performance we discussed at length on the Path call.
The video was to prove that I was wrong, that his performance wasn’t shabby, that he is not the way I described him
My description was based on what he said when he came to the call. Shabby, blah blah blah.
Le me teach you something really important:
Your power, your happiness, your results in your life will depend on your level of responsibility, aka ownership.
The more of ‘what happens’ you are willing to be responsible, the happier, the more powerful you become.
One of the things that almost no one is willing to be responsible is feedback.
Feedback shows you where what you think you did is different from how someone sees it.
You want to be responsible for how you are perceived, how what you say lands, how what you do is received.
Now you are screwed… It sure feels that way, but it’s not really true.
Although, if you remember, you can only be responsible for what belongs to you, and how someone hears you doesn’t seem like it belongs to you, it does.
That doesn’t mean you have control over it, but yet, you can be responsible for it. In being responsible for what you can control!
- John said: I was shabby. John said: I was unprepared.
- I heard: he was shabby. I heard: he was (again) unprepared.
- The video showed: he made some mistakes, but it was extremely well received and worth testing.
He argued with me, but it was too late. I had already heard what he said, and the rest is whitewashing… trying to rescue the day. Damage control…
- What he could have said: I worked really hard and I was really proud of what I had to show. It didn’t exactly go the way I envisioned it was going to go. I have learned from it.
Is that what he said? No. Was he describing the same scenario? Yes. But how he first described it was in a way, where he wasn’t responsible for what someone hears…
You do that all the time.
You say: I am stuck… and you expect the other person to take you seriously, and consider you intelligent.
You say: I am always in my head… and you expect the other person to want to talk to you, to consider you someone worth talking to…
Add your own self-deprecating statement…
OK, but what about when I say “I am stupid”? Great question, right? But if you listen, I am here to teach you something. I am here to teach you not to think you can get something, the truth in scanning stuff, I am here to teach that if you didn’t think you are so damn smart, maybe you could look again, or
You could be powerful if you took on that you are responsible for what people hear, how it lands, and how people end up thinking about you.
- You can say things differently
- You can stop saying anything… never occurred to you, did it?
- And when you make a mistake, just get the feedback, get the learning experience.
Don’t shoot from the hip. That also comes from you thinking you are so darn smart… consider that you aren’t. Even if you have a dozen Ph.D. or other letters after your name.
Consider that every moment you need to earn respect, esteem, or however you want to be heard.
And I am not an exception: I could definitely raise the percentage of time when I speak responsibly… Mostly outside of the blog or my courses… in my private life.
Is it work? Of course. Can you do it? If you put your heart to it, yes. Expect a lot of practice.
