From Fertilizer Comes Flowers

Overcoming adversity is the testament every successful person on the planet shares. Until you get knocked down, you have no idea what it is to get back up. Such is the beauty of life. However, that is not my focus today. Instead, I am writing about when the new version of you, your art and your creative business gets shredded.

As you evolve, learn your story, stand in your own light, you will come to have the intellectual understanding of how it all works. It will all make sense. You might even be able to sell it to potential clients, employees and colleagues. They were the ones ready to say yes in the first place. Then there will come along that client, employee or colleague who will find the weak spot – the place where intellect fails and conviction has to take over. And they will tear you down. Nothing worse.

Haters are going to hate, but shredders never look the part. Shredders want to believe in you but can smell uncertainty a mile away. Uncertainty breeds distrust and distrust is cancer. Distrust grows until your process is undone by your own lack of conviction.

It would be lovely if you could avoid the shredder but you cannot. They are a right of passage we all must endure to get to our bellies. They are there to show you the way to yourself, your art and the essence of your creative business’ value. You should thank them after you move past the deep desire to beat them with a stick.

You should thank them because they are making you defend the indefensible – you do it this way because it is YOUR way, intellectual or not. So long as you are not in the “Trust Me” business, but rather the “I Will Earn Your Trust” business, you will own your value after going through a few shredders. You might have to step up your game when it comes to proving and earning the value you demand, but that can only be a good thing.

Here is an example: if you are an interior designer who thinks themselves a presenter, have shifted to understanding the power of your ideas and the need to be paid for them, but not improved your presentation skills, you might underwhelm the shredder. Worse, you might invite the shredder to be a collaborator (“Can I see a few more options?” “What if we did the room in blue, not green the way you want to?”). All of a sudden, the idea that your client can only say yes or no and/or pay you money has disappeared along with your process. Shredders are the worst back street drivers there are, so if you let them in your car you better know how to drive.

The beauty of shifting to your own intrinsic process is that it is a statement on what you believe to be most valuable. The shadow of the shift is that you are probably not ready to prove it when you first do it. Shredders are awesome at exposing your own naïveté and demand that you recognize that the spotlight has no room for uncertainty. Never blame the shredder though. Sure, they might be crazy, but you have yet to move into your belly. If you get paid for presentation as a designer, you better make it worthy of the price. This is the lesson – fertilizer only makes flowers if you are willing to recognize the necessity of putting it in the ground in the first place.