Too Much You?

I’m not sure exactly what it is about the World We Live In today that suggests to us that we need to be careful, oh-so-careful, about the way that we speak, but naturally I have my own thoughts on it.

When I was “in the system”, growing up with a public-school education in the US, I was taught to:

• Follow the rules.
• Stay inside the lines.
• Not be too “informal” or “too much”.

This type of teaching was drilled into me with a deeper and deeper intensity the further into my education I went.  By the time I was in one of the country’s top universities, I was terrified of letting any of my actual personality out for fear that I’d break some sort of rule and be forced out.

Turns out this absolute soul-languishing experience, combined with my own incidental inability to conform, gave me enough bad grades for long enough that they politely asked me to pursue my academic exploits elsewhere.  Preferably somewhere that wouldn’t lead me back to them.

For the first time in my adult life I had made a decision based on who I was.  It was a real lesson.

An art degree gave me fulfilment I hadn’t yet known, but corporate life made that but a fond memory.

Years on, and yet another job with too much corporate rammed up its ass, and I really started to wilt.  Not long after that, I was doing what I should’ve always been doing:

My Own Thing.

So I was launched into the world as my own entity.  My own business where I made all the decisions, where I was the only gatekeeper on what was put “out there” into the world.

About 4 minutes after I launched my first company website, I heard those words again.

“Too informal” and “too much”.

I had to politely remind that I’m me, this was my website, and I’d have on it whatever I damn well pleased.

I also had to remind, myself included, that if the deal-breaker with a potential client was the fact that I wrote like I talk, like I think and like I act, then I was probably far better off without that client in my life anyway.

Years later, and I’ve revised my business and its offerings to something a bit different, and another iteration of the website has happened.  About 4 minutes after this one launched, a friend once again politely snuck those words in there again.

“Too informal” and “too much”.

I made the point once again, with my foot planted a little firmer in front of me this time, that if people didn’t like how I said what I have to say, then they are doing me a favour by not including themselves in my life.

We're all just people.

Clients are still people, and it still costs me a little bit of my soul to have to interact with them when I strongly dislike them (or they, me).  What amount of money is worth your soul, even a little bit of it?  (hint: don’t answer that unless you’re my brother)

Wouldn’t you want people who like you, who you in turn like, to engage you and your services?  Wouldn’t you rather deal with people that you get along with, that sought you out and chose you over the others because you’re YOU and no one else?

Everyday people engage in something that feeds their soul.  They happily part with their hard-earned dough to go to movies and listen to music and read books that are all almost completely made up of someone’s personality.  Purely (usually) and honestly (they try to, I'm pretty sure), nearly 100% THEM is boxed up and put out there and people gobble it up because they like it.

Why should someone trying to sell a website be any different?  Or a laywer?  Or a funeral director?  Or an accountant?

Alright, maybe not an accountant.  Heh.

But still, why should you be any different when you’re putting yourself out there?  When you’re running your own company and you’re the one making all the decisions and you’re the one trying to sell yourself and your services to folks you don’t know… wouldn’t you rather just be you, and know that you’re successful because of that?

I suppose if you think about it, that’s success in and of itself.

I’ll never speak corporate again, on my business’s website or on a client’s behalf.  It may not be proven that it helps or hurts, but I sure don’t think it’s worth the risk.

Posted by JuddHole

This blog was the one that changed everything in my life, so it stands to reason that it continue to do so. I hope it starts with my underwear.