Your instincts about your future, about the things driving you to create and learn and change, are precious things that need to be protected from well-meaning friends and family who can sabotage your plans and intentions. This quick video is a shot-in-the arm for those trying to change the world.
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TRANSCRIPT
My wife is not happy with my latest videos. Oh, she loves the content, but there are some details — as you just saw — that displease her. Part of it is just personal choice.
She didn’t like the close-ups of me chewing popcorn, but that was intentional — to show how seized I was by the message.
She’s got a point, though, about things like the fingerprints on the microwave door, or the poster not being tacked down. If we were having guests over, like in pre-pandemic times, we would certainly clean up the house a bit, so why not take the same care for my videos?
And she’d probably urge me to wear something other than “Dad jeans.”
But now she wants to have artistic approval over the look of my videos — even down to the framing of shots and the lighting.
And that’s where I draw the line. The only way I’m going to be any good at this is to follow *my* instincts about the message and how best to tell the story.
Now, if there are things that are distracting to viewers, I definitely want to reduce or eliminate those elements. But some, like me chewing on camera, are artistic choices that I don’t necessarily want to compromise on.
And that’s the real issue here. If you are doing something you are passionate about, there’s only so much help you can get from others before it becomes restrictive or creativity-by-committee — which equals death to creativity.
What my wife can’t know are the impulses or instincts driving me, and she can’t see the order of priorities I have about how things look.
I noticed the schlumpy jeans and the fingerprints on the microwave, but they didn’t bother me so much that I felt compelled to reshoot those bits. Both moments went by really quickly and I figured most people would be more curious about the story I was setting up than about my clothes or how we keep the kitchen.
The most important thing to me is giving you something that helps you look at your life with new eyes, and helps you shift even just one thing toward a better, more engaged life. Am I doing that? I hope so.
As well, telling a good story matters to me, since you have so many things you could spend your time on. In my book, that’s far more important than whether I’m wearing designer jeans or “dad jeans.”
So what’s the takeaway from all this?
Well, if you have a vision that’s pulling you forward — which I hope you do — then don’t be derailed by what others are saying. Of greater importance is what you’re hearing from your heart and your gut. Because the truer you are to what you’re feeling and how you approach the world, the greater will be your impact (and the more fun you’ll have) — even if it means showing up in Dad or Mom jeans and not allowing someone else to wordsmith your ideas.
Very often, what others want for you is what they really want for themselves — for how they would do it, or say it, or want something to be shown. And that’s okay. The rest of the world doesn’t have to share your vision — but the rest of the world also doesn’t get to *control* your vision.
So follow your instincts and keep your foot on the accelerator. Thank people for their advice, but don’t waver if it means watering down what you’re feeling called to do.
MUSIC CREDIT
“Off the Walls” by Harry Edvino