Following on from last week’s conversation begging you to not be a chameleon is a challenge to practice being proactive. If you appreciate your obligation to be the guide, to stand in your own light, to honor the challenge of transformative joy ahead, then you own your obligation to be proactive. Proactive in the sense that it is up to you to share what you, your art and creative business are all about so that potential clients can uniquely choose to align with you and your artistry.
Except we almost never practice proaction, only to be better at reaction. Read the opportunity, the person in front of you so that you can react in a way that elicits the response you seek (whether getting hired or other road to yes). What you almost never do is to be plain in the idea of what you are all about so that those who care the most know they are home.
Here is an exercise that I know most will find extraordinarily challenging simply because it is not a muscle you often use. Do it anyway.
Make three two minute videos, one every other day. The first video is you discussing what your art and your creative business stand for. Not longer than two minutes and do not watch it back. Skip a day. Then for the second video, why the work matters. Skip a day. The last video is what makes for an effective decision. Again, no video longer than two minutes. On day seven watch them all back for the first time. Now make another video not longer than five minutes answering all three questions. Skip a day. Make another not longer than four minutes. Next day make the last video, not longer than three minutes answering all three questions.
You will be left with a distilled version of the only three things that should matter to clients. EVER. The video will be the proactive foundation you can always find your way back to.
To remind you, change sucks. The inertia to change is overwhelming and if you are going to honor your creative business you have to embody the power of incremental moments toward larger change. This requires proaction — knowledge of purpose, intention and direction — and the willingness to own the responsibility for all three at all times. Yes, to simultaneously see the forest and the trees and the path forward.
When you are confronted with the desire to be reactive, no matter the reason, watch your video. It is your truth and if you trust it, your superpower. The world is filled with enough Diana Prince’s and Clark Kent’s, and is waiting for you to show up as Wonder Woman and Super Man. Your world might only be a client at a time, just let that be more than enough.
Embrace the challenge, share with those who are able to push you to go even further. This is no place to dull the edge. But please do not share the work with your clients as it is what needs to come from you directly. Your willingness to show up as you are is intoxicating and where faith, hope and trust will live. Do the work and then own it as singularly yours.
For those of you who think this might be hokey, overly simplistic or self-indulgent, you are wrong on all counts. We live in a visual world and practicing your ability to communicate and lead is its own reward. Choose yourself.
Good luck.
