Real Genius: How Much Showing Up Matters

I typically spend Sunday morning reading the paper, catching up on things, and generally feeding my brain quietly.  Today, I ran across two things that seemingly have nothing in common but in the end, had the same lesson.

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

The first was the the last installment of an overview of Ted Kennedy done by The Boston Globe. Now, the Kennedys are the Kennedys but in Massachusetts there is a unique place in our hearts for Ted. He is almost the definition of patriarch and is an example of the big, brash Irish man with a huge heart that can be found in communities all over Massachusetts. He's been with us for a long time - my whole life. The lesson of his life is one of persistance and slow progress in the face of overwhelming heartache. He kept learning from the challenges and kept standing up after he stumbled. And he showed all of us that if you keep doing that and you learn something by every experience, you develop into greatness. Whether you like his politics are not, he is worthy of admiration.

Image by jurvetson via Flickr

The second thing I watched this morning was Elizabeth Gilbert's TED talk. She was talking about creativity and how it often is associated with mental anguish for creative people. She thinks there is too much pressure because as a society we believe that the individual is the sole source of creativity and inspiration.  Elizabeth thinks we should think more like the ancient Greeks and Romans who believe we were inspired by genius rather than being a genius - meaning that the work we do is partly the result of our work and partly the result of something other (call it a fairy, a God, a muse). What this means is that we do not need to feel 100% responsible if the output of our work is extrondinary or not - it is not ours to control.  I really like this message and I don't think it applies just to the creative types amonst us - because anyone who is trying to change the world (even if just a small part of it) has this same issue. And I believe that there is too much complexity in how products become successful or whether our projects do what we intend them too to either take all the credit when they are wildly successful or to take all the blame when they do not work out. Success is always based on the reaction of others. All we can do is to keep doing our work - sometimes it will work out, sometimes it won't.

My take away for this morning is this. Keep showing up to the dance. It's not a new message but worth remebmering (and part of the point of the book Outliers if you want more). Whether I eventually - if ever - do something that deeply changes the lives of others is not really up to me...but it won't happen if I don't continue my work. It's a bit of a relief, no?

Comments

[Cort Johnson]

Very well said. Some might consider a 'genius' piece of work to be accomplished through some degree of luck. But if you ask me luck is one's determination to persevere and as you have said to no matter how difficult, 'show up to the dance'.

[Ari Herzog]

Is the takeaway, indeed, to keep showing up to the dance--or to keep dancing?

The former implies you are going to an external event; the latter indicates the event is internal to you, and you are spreading it wherever you go.

[Dans Organizasyon]

Thanks to organizations like the world is always needed