A Victim of My own Success

I'm trying to become a ghost.

After a year where I was doing too much, this school year, I am trying to pull back, do less, disappear. When I suggested giving up a leadership position earlier today, my colleagues wouldn't have it. They were upset that I was even considering leaving and were vehement about me staying. When I went to try to give up another position after that, the organizer looked so sad about it that i almost said I was just kidding right there.

I don't think I am doing very well at any of them. But apparently, I am too good at these jobs somehow to be allowed to give them up.

How do I get myself into these things?

Professionalism

We all have stuff. Life intrudes, things happen, etc. etc. ad infinidum. I am the master at being life's punching bag. It's a wonder I'm sane at all (thank you , Sheriff of Nottingham).

But the thing that makes us professionals is that we rise above all that, when we are given a task, when the boss (or art director, publisher and so on) gives us a job, we get to work, we push all that stuff away and we get it done. It's not easy. It's never easy, but we get it done. You can't control having to wait on other people but you can always control your end of it. Be the one who can always be counted on, be the one who they know can save the day and be the one gives answers where everyone else gives excuses. You will be the one that gets the call when everyone else is getting their next excuse prepared. Publishers don't respond to excuses, they respond to met deadlines.

Be THAT Guy! You have the talent and the drive, you know you do or you wouldn't be still pursuing this after all these years. You just need direction. Well here it is...go do it already!

Impact

I have a friend (no, really, I do) that had a crisis of faith recently. Not in any sort of God but in himself. He thought what he is doing, what he had accomplished and his impact on the world around him just didn't matter. I had to divest him of that notion quickly and help him realize that he does matter, that he has touched a lot of lives and in doing so, has made those lives better.

If you are reading this, that applies to you too. You make a difference. You touch lives. Just make sure that impact is always a positive one. Make the world better. Even if it is just one life at a time.