BOBC Podcast #136 Transcription: Is It Frivolous?
INTRODUCTION:
When your clients see what it all costs to create, it’s very easy for them to say, well, why? When the world demands crisis and the things you do are not about crisis, then what do you do? And how do you navigate the responsibility of living as opposed to just… Surviving. Well, it’s called being an artist and appreciating that the timing of everything will always lead its way back to you.
BODY:
So there’s a new Instagram handle called Nanty Narking, N A N T Y Narking. And what it is, is it’s telling you the real cost of luxury weddings. And wherever that might be big wedding, small weddings, international, national and they’re in response to, you know, big publications that are talking about average costs that are quite frankly, not close to what an average luxury wedding would cost or even not so average, which is what they’re out there publishing.
And I am sure it is very well intentioned what they’re doing and I think it’s fine. What they’re publishing and putting out there. Um, I don’t have a comment on the handle But the connotations are there the connotations are there when you’re looking at it either you’re looking at it, maybe the way they are looking at it that the actual cost of having a wedding is far greater than what these other Publications are saying or someone else might be looking and it’s like oh my god Who would spend a million dollars or three hundred and eighty thousand dollars or whatever number they’re putting out there, for the wedding on a wedding. That’s just crazy to spend for one day on this things. And, you know, whether you’re spending on, , 20, 30, 40 ,50, 200000 Dollars, on decor or things like that, it get kind of skews what could be perceived as, why would you ever spend this kind of money on a wedding? And at the end of the day, what happens is that you start to see the numbers and you would say, Whoa, why, why would you ever spend that? And so then you get to the idea of frivolity. You get the idea of, isn’t it frivolous to spend the money on, or this kind of money on an event, on a house, on a cake, on a photograph, right? Isn’t it frivolous? And the answer that I have for that is yeah, it is.
The answer, of course it is right? But it’s also the difference between being living and surviving. It’s what people aspire to in order to feel good about the lives that they’re living, given whatever social status or whatever social client and social world they’re in. And that’s the investment that they choose to make.
And when you see numbers in a vacuum. They become unintelligible because as a rational matter, they don’t make any sense. Who would spend this money on something for one day or spend this money on a house that you don’t need to spend this money in the house. You can sleep with Ikea furniture. Who says you have to go and spend the kind of money you’re going to spend in your house?
The answer is you don’t have to, right? And so we get then to the age old part of things that are really, really important for us to circle back to and understand, especially when the world is really, you know, Jamie Dimon from, uh, Chase, has said that this is the most dangerous time that he’s ever experienced.
And I don’t necessarily disagree with them, right? We have wars on two fronts now, and we have things that are very polarizing in the United States in terms of what’s happening in Israel. And I am most certainly not commenting one way or another. I just believe human atrocity is human atrocity. and that, it just is, it is unconscionable on all fronts.
That’s as far as I’m going to go there. Because I think what it has done though, and what I will comment on it is it’s certainly, certainly drawn out, the idea that we are at a fractious time. More so than we might see by seeing a war from, far away, right? And so it all comes home and we’re all here in the United States dealing with it as we are probably around the world.
I can’t speak for places outside of where I live, but I know where I live. We’re fraught. And so then the question is, is how can you talk about? You know, a wedding, a house, a cake at the very time when people are dying. Innocent people are dying in Israel.
It pales in that conversation or to post about something that is what you’re doing that feels kind of tone deaf to the seriousness of what’s going on. Oh, and by the way, we, as a world live this when COVID hit. . How do you talk about whatever it is you’re doing when people are dying in emergency rooms during that crisis? And what do we do and how do we react?
The point of that is, is like, you may not talk about it now. You may have to sit aside, but it doesn’t denigrate the responsibility and the seriousness of what it is that you do. And I think that’s what gets lost, right? Is the idea, cause you can be exposed to the frivolity of what you’re doing. And I’m trying to draw the thread and I hope I’m doing a good enough job with it. When you see someone spending a million dollars on a wedding or spending millions of dollars on a house or whatever absurd number that you might think is absurd on the outside, when there are serious other things that make it feel like it’s not important, right? So wars, right? And COVID, then it makes you feel like the entirety of the endeavor is just purely frivolous. And therefore just like a whimsical indulgence that only those of tremendous means can afford and therefore just something that becomes far removed, from anything that matters.
And then, you lose the thread. And if you believe that as part of the person providing that, right, that service or that product to someone, then you start to denigrate the value that you impose on someone. And I very much understand that. I do. I really get it. I get how you could go there and feel that way. And then how do you come back to the world that you actually inhabit and where you’re about it. Well, it’s to take responsibility that you’re not there to change the world. No creative business is there to change the world. You like me are starfish people. You’re there to change the person across the table from you.
You’re there to get them to think another way. However, that might be. To think another way about themselves during their wedding, about themselves at their house, about themselves when they see a picture, and on and on and on. You’re there to open their eyes to a world they cannot yet see, and therefore give them a window into what is possible for them.
And so if you can know that as the moment passes, as COVID passes, as wars resolve themselves, because inevitably they will, it might take, you know, a month, it might take 20 years, but they will resolve themselves. And at the end of the day, it’s about looking as to what the possibility for tomorrow might be.
And that’s what you are. Right? You represent what could be and how we might ultimately aspire to that. Now, again, I don’t say that you should be racing out and saying, Hey, look at me, look at me, look at me. During a time when people are just not thinking about that in the world, I get that, but all roads will lead back to you. Will lead back to you and your business. And so for me, it is never about, you know, my skillset is not bringing somebody to your door. I can comment on it, but it is not what I do. But I am always, always, always focused on who is going to answer the door when they knock. Because it is so easy to ignore what that looks like. So easy to make it just about the sell, right? So easy to make it just about, can I take your money from you, right? Without the gravitas of why and what your intentionality is going to be and the purpose of what you’re meant to do and how to do it. So, I find it fascinating, and this is not from me, I got this information from someone else that there are, you know, a lot of bridal salons are offering their gowns but not putting specific prices on them. And are letting the, basically the market determine what the value is within a range, which is in a very tight range. And you would think that would be not acceptable, right? Because don’t you want to know what the price of your gown is going to be? But they’re finding tremendous success today.
And the reason is, is because it’s not about the dress. It never has been and it never will be. It’s about the experience to the dress, experience to discover that dress. How do you feel when you find it and what it’s going to be? And what does that value look like for you? And so they’re just blowing up the notion that it’s a commodity that you can choose off the shelf and buy it like anything else. Now is it fraught with the idea of being manipulation and everything else like that? Sure. But those that do it impunity and professionalism and integrity should be very proud of what they’re going to do because it’s about the experience and it’s about the value connoted and appreciating those that are willing to value as you would place that value is worthwhile.
I’m all for it. I think it’s great. I think it’s great. Provided it’s not manipulative. Now, the second it becomes manipulative, I’m going to be wildly anti it because it will be everything I’m against. But in the narrow window that it is, and the idea of creating emotional residence and intelligence for those that stand across from you in places where that heretofore has never existed, I am all for that, right?
Because that transforms business. It makes us understand. That the possibility of relationship is going to transcend price, right? The value connoted is not going to be the thing that you’re buying. It’s going to be the thing that we are going to provide and then ultimately will reach the right value for you, right?
And you’ll be able to do things that make the most sense for everybody. And really, ultimately, by not sharing the price, you’ll be taking price off the table, not in a manipulative way, but in a powerful way. Now there are those that are jaded on the other side. There’ll be like, no, no, no. Just a way for all these stores to make a little bit of extra money and take a few extra a hundred dollars from clients.
And maybe, and if that’s what happens, I’m not with it at all, but I don’t think that to be true. I think the ones that are running it the right way are very specific about who they are. Understand their clients really well and are trying to drive value far more than anything else. And by removing price, they create a different level of information that’s provided, which is the ultimate point of this conversation.
The information that you share with clients is your decision. If you choose to share that information, then you’re going to rely on the fact that it is important, right? Do not be deluded into the idea that you have to share the information no matter how much the person on the other side wants it. Your job is to share the information because it’s your story to tell.
And if a bridal store doesn’t want to share the price of a gown because they want you to make a different kind of decision about the gown. And the process of getting to the gown. Awesome. I think that’s fantastic because it relies on the idea that what creative business is, even if that product does exist and it does for a gown is that the journey to the element is what matters.
Not the element. And so getting in that place in that way for you to be emotionally intelligent creates a different way for you to do what? To make it relevant to what I’ve talked about earlier is it gives you a possibility to make it about gravitas to make it about, that ultimately, that your role is to create joy to create transformation to provide possibility to be those that are in the position to affect change.
Now, it may not be in that way, because it might feel self indulgent as at a moment when crisis happens, but ultimately people want to be alive, they don’t want to just survive. They want to feel a purpose to their lives and they want to feel hope for what could be. And in fact, really, they don’t want to have hope because they don’t want to blindly think that maybe this could work out or not work out, they want to have faith that it will.
They want to have faith that if they put trust in the creative aspect of what you’re going to be, that they will be transformed as they aspire to be. So they really do want to kill hope in the sense that they don’t want to hope it works out. They want to have faith that it will. And faith is a beautiful thing and it has nothing to do with religion.
If you happen to believe in a particular religion, I think that’s awesome. But what I’m talking about is faith. Faith in that what is uncertain will be resolved if only you’re vulnerable. If only that you find the wisdom to be curious and to allow those that can impact your life to impact your life. You aspire for that, of course, from your clients, but you also have to start first.
You also have to be willing to be vulnerable in order to receive that vulnerability. And if you do, then you will be able to, what, affect change. And if you do that by making sure that the purity of your conversation is where it’s supposed to be, So to give that bridal gown example again, if you make it about emotion and connection, then you will and not allow that rational, this is what that costs come into the conversation until it’s time for it to come into the conversation, then and only then will you be in a position to maintain what it is that you’re actually doing far and above and beyond the thing, which of course gets us to AI. And I know it might be a broken record about AI, but the thing about AI is that it’s going to do, which I heard, and really can now understand is that what AI will do is it will make things go faster and faster because it’s going to learn from itself, right?
It’s going to go back, do it, and then learn to do it better and keep doing it better and therefore make everything better faster. Right? And when that happens, it’s just going to continually raise the bar for what could be the humanity is what can rise above that. And I love that for creative business because it will allow the platforms to get ever higher. So that those that just want the commodity, they don’t care to get it. And those of you who want to be lazy enough to just provide commodity, well, you’re going to pay the price for that. But for those that want to work with emotional intelligence, I highly suggest that you throw away all the reports that say this business is not good, or this business is suffering or that stuff, because it’s not relevant.
It’s like saying that I’m supposed to evaluate my high end restaurant based on the way the casual changes are doing. It’s not the same business, right? And the more that you appreciate the emotionality and the connectivity that you represent in a time when the world is telling you that it’s frivolous and we shouldn’t be talking about these things, the more that you can just say, Maybe not today, but most certainly tomorrow and when we talk about tomorrow, I will be able to then give you hope for what the day after tomorrow looks like.
And in that way, we are all alive. And in that way, you will then come back to the responsibility that is spoken to you to do the work of change and change creates joy and joy creates transcendence. And from there, we all are better off. That is my hope for all of you and my talk for today.
Thanks so much for listening.
