The Mentor | #14 | Show Up
Each month, I share 3 things I've read on skills, careers, and personal development.
Just show up. Move your body toward your dreams. Go to where they’re happening–the gym, the office, the yoga class. Be there physically. -Patricia Madson
The year before I started working full time, I had a discussion with a mentor who told me that the best advice they could offer was ‘show up everyday’. I probed further on what that meant. It was not simply the notion of being physically present (although that was important), but it was about being prepared, well read, volunteering to assist, and having a bias for action. ‘Showing up’ really meant to be ready for anything, at anytime, and being willing to put yourself out there.
In the first 6 months of my first job, I was sitting in a room with a number of newly hired consultants. A consulting Partner came into the room and said that she had some work for anyone that knew ‘Visio’. Now, ‘billable hours’ is gold for a new consultant, so it was enticing. But, I had never heard of Visio and no one else had either. So, as everyone looked at their shoes, I raised my hand and said, ‘I’ll do it. Let me know when we start’. The Partner said I would start the following week.
I left the office that day and headed directly to a book store (there were many back then), bought 3 books on Visio and became proficient quickly. It turned out, fortunately, that Visio was not too hard to learn. But, I would have never known that, nor had that opportunity, had I not been ‘reckless’ enough to raise my hand. For me, that was my first example of ‘showing up’. Sometimes, it pays to be a little reckless.
1
If you want to be an artist, get yourself into an art scene. If you want to be a sports broadcaster, then get yourself to where broadcasters work, live, or socialize. Get into the scene, where you want to be. In this sense, physical proximity makes a difference. But, it could also be digital proximity.
2
The more you do something, the more experience you get. In many cases, you will not be happy with your level of performance, but as the saying goes ‘practice makes perfect’. The biggest mistake is not trying something, because you are afraid of producing something poor. Ed Sheeran calls it ‘getting the bad songs out’.
3
A famous football coach once said, “‘When facing a difficult task, act like it’s a piece of cake”. It is easy to get intimidated by something you have never done before, or so called ‘imposter syndrome’. But everyone started somewhere. Everyone was once the person with no experience. It’s all about changing your mindset.