Why Creatives Are Kick-Ass Confidence Gods (Pt. 2)
IF CONSUMED IRRESPONSIBLY, compliments are a sweet kind of poison. If consumed responsibly, criticism is a healthy power tonic with more boost juice than a Red Bull factory. This is because some critics actually take the time to embed well-formed and useful little insights of improvement into those balls of ca-ca before they throw it. And if you’re a smart, resilient and resourceful creative, you’ll dig those invaluable pearls of customer feedback out of the dung, wash them off and use them to grow stronger and greater at what you do.
Don't miss the opportunity a criticism affords you. Throw the critic a middle-finger, a smile, and a “thank you” for the free consultation –– then grow into a beast off of their nutritious negativity.
CRITICISM IS BROCCOLI AND COMPLIMENTS ARE COOKIES
Compliments, on the other hand are sweet –– but can be sweetened poison. They blow a nice breeze up your skirt for a second. But they truly do nothing other than boost your pointless ego. And if you’re thirsty like that, go ahead, drink-up. But, beware.
Compliments, a.k.a. ego-snacks, for some people, are food for a monster. Ego is the monster –– and it’s an unruly one at that. Ego, in essence, is the dramatic opposite of confidence.
Ego is a bottom-less pit of swirling insecurity that can never be satiated. Keep feeding it sweet snacks and it will need more, and more, and more. It will eventually eat you alive, one way or another. Egos are heavy, useless, blindness-inducing, 3-ton anvil medallions on necklaces that do nothing but slowly bury those burdened with them. Do not feed the egos.
Creatives, listen. Consume your compliments wisely. Compliments, consumed irresponsibly, are like Krispy Kreme doughnuts –– sweet little nothings that often do ZERO to forward your ability to improve. Sweet and tasty though. Right? Right. Treat them like the desserts they are –– like one per day –– if you must consume them at all. Never make them the main course of any meal. Take them or leave them. I smile at them and leave them. It’s okay to nibble off of one on some day when you are feeling down about yourself, sure. But some of you roll-up in the fetal position with the compliment you receive, spooning with it for hours under the covers. That ain’t healthy bro. Don’t get co-dependent on compliments and their dispensers. That’s just another nasty little addict-making drug. That’s just another little nasty drug dealer.
I’m kind of making a big deal out of compliments because they are constructed to appear harmless. Everybody knows to protect themselves from criticism simply because of the bad taste it leaves in the mouth. People treat criticism like a 7-year old treats broccoli on its plate. He or she would rather have cookies on their plate. But which one could advance their health? So should you really be fearfully shunning all of those criticisms and naively embracing all of those compliments? Good question. You should really, really think about that. Broccoli, or cookies?
Compliments are so deft, so tricky and so cunning they can often even make you rest on your laurels, put you to sleep, and render you fish-food –– for the hungrier big-fish coming up in your rear-view to chomp you –– all because you were too busy sitting idle, tongue-kissing your trophies and plaques while waxing romantic about the millions of likes on your IG page. Yeah. Those sweet little innocent compliments.
For the smartest creatives reading this, there is a lot of wisdom between these words. You would have to be the most confident of these confidence gods to really get it, and use it.
As for everyone else…
If you know you have confidence issues, don’t get hooked by the sweet snacks nor the sour ones. When they throw rocks or flowers at you, it’s best not to make either too much of a big deal. Just stay focused on doing whatever it is you do best. Keep it creatively moving. You can read all of the comments (adoring or besmirching) 30-years from now when you retire.
“Some said: ‘Hov, how you get so fly?’ I said: ‘from not being afraid to fall out the sky·“
— Jay Z
CREATIVES ARE KICK-ASS CONFIDENCE GODS SO SIT DOWN & STFU
Yes, this little talk is my ode to the Creative Community. This is my nod and tip of the hat. Today, I want the world to step back and take another look at what creatives do, how they do it, and an invitation to re-think their respect for the CREATIVES who have the fortitude it takes to DO it. Creatives deserve your honor –– as they are being something that most humans are afraid to be: VULNERABLE.
I want creatives to know the power of who they are and the power of what they do.
There is nothing worse a human being hates than vulnerability. That goes for physical vulnerability, emotional vulnerability or financial vulnerability –– which, in this world, kind of circles back around to the first one. But CREATIVES brave all of those vulnerabilities to do what they do. They dive right into the deepest waters other humans are afraid to swim.
You always hear the term starving artists but you never hear the term starving architect or starving doctor. That’s because some routes in life are safer than others. And many creatives take the routes in life that would make most humans shudder in fear.
So, what am I ultimately saying? What I’m saying is this. Even if your friend who thinks he’s great on guitar, but isn’t, decided to drop everything in pursuit of becoming the next whoever, but doesn’t, of course –– he still needs to be commended for his courage to get on the court and take the shot. It takes big brassy bawls to want to be the next guitar rock god but can’t really play that well. And don’t dismiss this person as delusional. Do you realize how many top singers, rappers and actors can’t really sing, rap or act?
Talent isn’t the metric for success in Hollywood. Bawls and perseverance despite all odds are. And my question Is, “How many of you accountants, and lawyers, and corporate execs have a pair of brassy ones big enough to take that kind of gamble with your life and livelihood?” Funny, I hear crickets chirping. Don’t you?
Many doctors and architects and lawyers are rich and secretly miserable, secretly feeling they’ve betrayed their one true loves, their one life’s passion, for life security. I will leave it up to you to determine who made the best decision. But know this… it kills a soul when that soul knows it didn’t even try.
CREATIVES DESERVE MORE OF OUR RESPECT AND MORE SELF-RESPECT
CREATIVES, a.k.a. “confidence gods,” deserve our respect just for being creatives. Period. They walk before the firing-lines of judgment, evaluation and criticism everyday with no bulletproof vests on. They live out on the skinniest branches of life (to coin a phrase I once heard).
CREATIVES frolic, twirl, dance and do handstands out on those breakable branch tips like Cirque du Soleil acrobats. And they do so while those armchair critics hug the tree-trunks like little delicate koalas, throwing hate from their little safety zones. These criticizing little koala rodents are simply the spectators and not the ‘players’ in life. They are not willing to risk it all to win it all. They troll and set up tent-cities of hate in your comments box instead of developing the bawls to move up to the content box. Never let their comments matter that much. It’s just white noise from the bleachers.
So, I hereby give a standing ovation to the CREATIVE –– not for their creative works, not for their astounding stage performance, but for simply having the gumption to walk into the arena and head for the stage. It takes an uncommon human being to have the uncommon substance to do that. If you are not down on the field of dreams with the gladiators, you should keep your sh*t-talking comments in the stands to a minimum –– because –– you’re in the stands, doing the minimum. Never forget that.
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. ”
[LEARN MORE]
Brené Brown: "Why Your Critics Aren’t The Ones Who Count"
Watch Author and Researcher Brené Brown give an amazing talk on the subject of critics and criticism at the 99U conference.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T
