Artists have BIG balls

Artists have BIG balls in my opinion. Why?  Because they are themselves. Nothing more, nothing less. When we're kids, we're free to be ourselves...free to jump, free to scream, free to pee!! (sometimes gladly on ourselves :) As we get older, however, freedom diminishes.  Society continually stuffs our lives with sets of rules, parents, teachers, and more rules devoted to building us into people that can live within society with acceptable character traits.  "NO!!", "Don't do that, do this", "What are you thinking?" "Your boss is going to be pissed"..........all said and done....bye bye peeing-on-yourself days. It stings the first few times being told NO, (you cry), but eventually you get less emotional, (few tears), to even unaffected (rock face). In the corporate world, it's very easy to fall into a trap of achieving what is expected.  Nothing more or else it looks like you're unfocused.  Nothing less or else it looks like you're not working hard enough.  I think many fear hearing someone say "NO!".  That would imply still being a kid, and obviously that will not accelerate our career paths. That's why I love artists.  They take large amounts of criticism, back lash, rejection, disappointment, .etc...and yet they continue doing what makes them so unique.  It's almost as if they said, "I don't care what you think.  I care what I think." Well many of us may dream to be artists.  We commonly think of being a painter, photographer, or the next Justin Timberlake (sorry ladies, but Justin Bieber is before my music generation).  But I like to think of an artist as simply being "a person whose work exhibits exceptional skill" (oddly the fifth definition).  For me, this is something that anyone can be. We are all artist if we believe it. A side note, next time at work when you get knocked down or frowned upon for trying to push your creative ideas that you feel passionate about, maybe you should consider whether or not you want to become such a person.

What the @#$% Entelechy

uhhhh definitely one of those unheard of GRE words....more to come. I'm at the end of reading a business book that grew popularity in the 1990s, particularly in the IT world.  It's entitled SPIN Selling written by Neil Rackham.
Media_httpwwwassocama_wsxhb
I'm enjoying it, and have recommended it to my friends (25-33 yrs old) who are at the beginning of their selling and or marketing careers.  Why?  For me, it's provided some smart insight into what executives/decision makers think and consider when going through a sales process and what types of techniques are most effective to get conversations moving forward. Neil also talks about one of his favorite words, Entelechy.  Dictionary.com defines this word as a realization or actuality as opposed to a potentiality.  I define it as taking a dream or aspiration and turning it into a concreate, real substance.  But sad to say, which I plan to discuss with my friends is that "The sad fact is that we generally work harder and more effectively to learn knowledge than translate our knowledge into skills" (Neil Rackham) We surf the hell out of the web... And we learn tons.  I just saw this commercial demonstrating this idea through a spelling during my recent visit to the States.  It demonstrates how people absorb tons of information, and we are becoming more knowledgeable.  Via facebook, favorite blogs, favorite journals that are becoming ever so accessible, we can talk about anything.  I can tell you about problems going on in Afghanistan to the latest gossip about Paris Hilton.  Heck, if you give me 5 minutes, I'll tell you about where to book the most luxurious Transatlantic yacht ride and when the 2nd generation iPad is to become available.  We all can do this and yet at the end of the day, what are we going to do with all this knowledge? Sadly, but realistically speaking, most people won't do much. We will continue to complain about our governments, bosses, ongoing problems in the world because it's easy to do.  It's easy to ridicule "others" for inappropriate behavior or actions because they are held responsible, not you.  And interestingly enough, we are knowledgeable enough to criticize others, yet most of us will not actually attempt to change them or as Seth Godin suggests, the status quo.  Most of us will simply go on day after day complaining rather than trying to spur a change. And that's the the problem.  In doing so, we are not using our knowledge to reach our potential, our ability to change things.  There's probably a countless of times you wished for something, but how many wishes did you try and change into a reality? How about the next time you feel like complaining about something, ask yourself if you would challenge yourself to change it.  Would you try to fix the problem because let's face it, the world would be far better off.  And you would probably feel more self-gratified as well knowing that you strived to reach your potential. As for the commercial  I mentioned about: