Ever seen a blind stray?
No.
They stay home in familiar surroundings to avoid turning a corner and being hit by a bus - no nasty surprises.
I feel like a blind stray sometimes - wandering through job adverts that ask for "miracle superhuman knowledge and skill sets" - management experience, coding experience, design experience, social media experience and "impeccable" communications skills (that's one job!).
Freelancing would be easier - don't you think?
HellO! Do these people you seek exist?
Doing a lot of assessing between working casually and investigating options like blogging, freelancing and rewriting my book - again!
That always takes me a while to work up to.
A few weeks ago, I responded to an ad in a shop window asking for someone to work in the shop - they sell photographic canvasses.
I rang the number. The woman's response to my croaky voice (I was quite sick at the time) goes something like this:
"We are looking for someone bright and bubbly who can work in the shop, take studio photos, airbrush glam photos, photo stitch to customers needs, and bring in trade work from the interior design industry."
Quite took the wind out of me because I kept seeing that tacky little hand-written, faxed note in the shop window, in the shop with all the tacky art.
"Does that sound like you?" she intones.
I croak: "I'm actually looking for something somewhat less intense."
I don't think Miley is available either.
I know I'm not the only person trying to navigate this wonderful digital revolution that makes retailing such a nightmare!
There are parents trying to find their way around so they can guide their children into an uncertain future.
Teachers literally being assaulted from all directions: new curriculums, new technology, kids with knives.
What the heck?
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I've been evaluating all the supposed positivity and "self-help" hype on Twitter, in blogs and books.
I've listened to podcasts about blogging and inbound marketing and maximising SEO and how to "make it" in the digital space.
It's all a bit overwhelming - like the first day at a new school.
I'm wearing the same skin today as I wore on my first day of school when I sat at a desk listening to the teacher speak English unable to understand a word - just like a blind dog stumbling down the road.
I spoke only Russian until I was five, even though I was born here in Brisbane.
Have you had an experience like this?
I think it enables you to tolerate change and uncertainty for longer than most people.
It also enables you to learn a new language as fast as practicable.
But you need good information to go on to succeed and learn how to make decisions that lead you where you want to go.
It's constant trial and error.
This doesn't appear in your CV - it may appear as stubbornness though.
People who aren't afraid to fail learn technology faster - they jump in with both feet, click all the buttons until they find a pattern and they learn how it works.
What's the worst that can happen? You stuff it up and start again - just don't use html! You think YOU are going to break the computer? There's an induction right?
You might break the Tamagochi. Thank goodness I didn't! Despite my niece's skepticism.
Sometimes it's not the fear of failure but the lack of faith that breaks you.
I can see lack of faith.
There's another favourite saying: "Do or do not. There is no try."
I fear that we are creating a fairly frightening scenario for mere mortals - we are not Jedi.
Well, except you of course!
I only did one psychology subject at uni: Psychology 101 where I learned the theory of two kinds of people risk takers and risk avoiders.
This experiment identified this dichotomy by dividing people into those who use the footpath and those who cross the grass.
What do you think "blind dogs" who need paths feel when someone tells them: Fail fast?
There is no success without risk - doomed is everyone who takes the way of "the path".
We're all wearing the same skin we wore when we were born - all pre-programmed.
Wouldn't it be great if you could edit video, photos, text and audio in the one program?
Programs usually have strengths.
Photoshop to edit a photo and something like Word to edit a document?
Don't you like to play to your strengths?
If we are going to talk about taking risks then organizations need to take as many risks as individuals and create new paths because most people need a path - come to think of it even Jedi follow a path.
Are we going to abandon all paths? I think not.
You know I've decided that there are actually four kinds of people: risk takers, risk avoiders, those who are pushed, and those who decide when to change and when to take a risk.
Which brings me to my point: the greatest need now is to be well informed.
People go on about how the internet grants individuals unparalleled opportunity and power to reach their greatest potential without the help of a path or an organization - free agents!
This thought is like extinguishing the "eternal light with which childhood fills the world", like telling 8-year-old Virginia to go buy her own Christmas present because there is no damn Santa Claus - to all the people who never want to run their own business.
AND, after trawling for months I've discovered something really important.
There is a well-worn path that bloggers and Twitterers and social media folk follow - they are publishing respectable books on the subject of these paths.
Conferences are devoted to sharing these paths and figuring out new ones.
So don't let them pull the wool over your eyes.
Here's the beware: there's copy and then there's copy.
Until now I never thought much about "copywriting" - that's what they call advertising scripts.
It's what they call the content of blogs.
It's also the term used in journalism - why don't we have different words?
Do other languages have different words to differentiate between advertising copy and editorial copy?
So disappointing. I thought all of this copywriting stuff was exciting until I started to hear the same line regurgitated over and over again in different blogs.
It's like someone starts singing..."Row, row, row your boat...
And off they go, round after round.... like the murder of crows outside my window in the morning.
This digital world is not so very different from "traditional media" - they're struggling to fill space, lots and lots of space.
They're all feeding off each other just like newspapers feed off TV and TV sponges off everyone - the internet is even worse than TV!
The same bloggers who blurt about "authenticity" and "success" and "fail fast" are actually marketing personal brands, personal empires.
It should be compulsory to declare affiliate deals - off-line there's a law against Collusion.
As a journalist I tried to be "authentic".
Tell it how you see it.
Collect the facts.
Communicate as impartially and simply as possible.
You need to appreciate the difference between copywriting and journalism - don't you think?
That line is blurring faster in the digital space than in newspapers I think.
You need to be able to identify copy from copy.
It's crucial - as crucial as understanding that when you hit that "update" or "send" button you are PUBLISHING to the web.
Otherwise you might as well be waiting for the Cat Bus, a fantasy character out of my favourite animation Totoro:
It's about two little girls coping with change and uncertainty who meet a tree spirit.
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Now clear off because I'm waiting for the Cat Bus, he takes you where ever you need to be. Listen to the music and you may understand:
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