238. Tired Talk


Version 2: Hustle:



Whenever I make the mistake of logging into LinkedIn, all I find are regurgitations of regurgitations of regurgitations. You'll find  posts titled "Don't fire your staff to success", and they get 10,000 likes and a few hundred 'amen's. "Your staff are people, too" 7,000 thinky faces and a few 'interesting take' comments. 

Am I callous? Tired? Bored? Apathetic? Yes, and I still I don't believe that every combination of uplifting words deserves such an enthusiastic response. Part of the problem is that everything in this current world is about churning content. You're incentivized with more followers and more opportunities the more you post stuff. Regardless of the stuff. Requotes, retweets, your opinion on an opinion on an opinion. This system makes even your most interesting contact sound like Stuart Smalley. 

One time, I went with a good friend to one of these A-type events, like a Lollapalooza but only for people with MBAs. And let me tell ya, peeps got excited AF to hear about the guy who sold 1,000,000 gluten free donuts or wrote a book about a guy who wrote a book about a business.  I honestly saw more excited people at this thing than in some raves in the '90s. I felt as mystified about these people as I felt when I went to a church in the United States and people were swaying and holding their hands out, like what were they on that I wasn't? 

Perhaps that's another part of the problem. Where are the quiet people who just want to do a great job during their working hours and go home to their hobbies?  By their very nature you won't hear about them, so you will always think success is reserved only for the extroverted person forwarding you a poorly cited Gandhi quote while networking with the person next in line at Starbucks on a Sunday. 

In the most ironic end to a post ever, I'll finish with a quote:

“Be yourself – not your idea of what you think somebody else’s idea of yourself should be.” – Henry David Thoreau

Extra Panel: My original idea, that got converted into the other two through by talking to some of my people.  


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