Blowing Your Own Trumpet!!

Being good at your work counts but being able to showcase that work is equally important too. This is especially true when your job is your art or vice-versa – your art is your job.

Consider an artist who creates mind-blowing work in a dungeon but never displays it to anyone. If that art is also his livelihood he will never sell anything and soon run out of money and possibly cease to exist and so will his art.

Compare this to a scenario where a person creates good work (not low quality) and knows how to sell it. The good worker may get only half of what a mind-blowing artist would get (if he sold) but he will live to create more art, learn and improve upon it.

Not trying to undermine the importance of great work, but showcasing your work is part of the Genius. You may create the sharpest knives in the world but if you are not able to convince somebody to use them they will eventually rust and become useless.

The Genius not only does great work but takes pride in showcasing it equally well.

Options and Excuses

Does having more options mean more excuses and more failures?

Does having the comfort of knowing that even if you fail you have something else to fall back on, prevent you from giving a chance that you have your all?

Does having multiple options and the luxury of choosing what you like take away the killer instinct?

Is it the options or the attitude that determine whether you look for excuses for your failures or look to learn from it?

I know most of you would instantaneously say in unison it’s the attitude. But I am interested in understanding the role of availability of options in shaping a person’s behavior and attitude.

A professional who knows he is and deserves much better than what he is getting at his current job doesn’t do anything about it and continues at the same job, cribbing about it every other day because he has the option of staying back in an environment which he is not happy with but has known for years and hence gives him a sense of security.