How are you showing up? Does it matter?

How you present yourself matters. How you show up in the world matters has an impact on on you, it has an impact on people that you know it has an impact on people, you’re just meeting it has an impact on people who are seeing you, but you are not interacting with it matters. Now, I think I wonder how many people spend time thinking about that. And wonder how many people spend time thinking about that and decide to be counter and say, I’m going to show up this way, because I’m going to have an impact or it’s going to have an impact negatively positively shocked people, whatever it might be. Our people are just kind of going through the motions and not really thinking about the way that I’m presenting myself, the clothes that I’m wearing, the way I’m carrying myself, my actual posture, all these things, how intentional how, how Cognizant how mindful, how aware, are most people about that? Certainly, we spend a lot of time thinking about fashion, and we look at what other people are wearing. And we critique and, and this that another thing, we’re we’re fascinated by celebrity culture and by music, and we’re influenced by the Arts and by famous celebrities, and actors and everything else. And how much are we aware of? How much are we thinking about the way that we are presenting ourselves and how much it matters, because again, how you are showing up and how you are putting yourself into the world really does matter. This is something I learned really a long time ago, when I was when I was probably probably a teenager, as I’m sure that we all did we recognize that, Oh, I get certain kinds of attention. When I dress like this, when I talk like this when I present myself like this. For me, and it’s I assume that this is there’s going to be a lot of differences and similarities between men and women I can only speak to, to my lived experience as a as a man, and as a boy and a teenage boy and then into young adulthood. But I recognized Well, let me take a step back, I wanted to feel like I had control. And I discovered that I had a greater sense of that by presenting myself in a certain way. So carrying myself in a more grown up fashion. And speaking in a more grown up fashion and acting in a more adult fashion. I felt like I would get more respect. I felt like I would have more control. Now whether that’s true or not. That’s the way that that I felt. So I recognized the importance of presenting myself in in a certain way. And that I had the ability to influence the way that other people then interacted with me the way that other people perceived me. Now at the end of the day, people are going to think about or perceive me however they’re going to do that. But again, we all have the ability to influence and to put ourselves in the position to be received perceived. However we’re interested in in doing that. What made me think about this again, and I think about it a fair amount is the the John Fetterman. The Senator John Fetterman dress code in Congress thing, where I don’t know where it stands, if they’re still doing it or not, but for a period of time, they really they relaxed the dress code of the United States Senate. So he could wear basketball shorts, and a hoodie. Which is just so preposterous to me. It’s so preposterous to me that they would make a decision to do that. Now you might be thinking that that’s a wonderful thing. And if that’s what you think, we just have a difference of opinion. And I’m not trying to put my values on you. I’m just expressing my opinion and you can take and do with it, whatever you like. But this is what got me going on this again, got me thinking about it again. And again. You can see how much our culture has changed and always does change. Our fashion choices have very much changed from the 1920s, to the depression War era, and how that shifted things. And then obviously into counterculture and the 60s and hippies, and, and then we had, you know, glam rock, and then we had grunge. And now fast forward, we have athleisure wear. And when you go on an airplane, you don’t wear a suit anymore. There’s just so it’s constantly changing and evolving. And that’s nothing but a good thing. It’s nothing but a wonderfully good thing. And I think it’s really great that we have the ability to decide to express ourselves, if that’s something that we’re doing, or to fit in, if that’s something that we’re interested in doing. There’s companies, whether it’s true or not used to be, from what I understand with the IBM and you wear, the blue suit, and the red tie, whatever it is, there was a uniform a dress code, whether it was formalized, or part of the policy or not, this is just what people did, and how people wore clothes. So how you show up makes just such a huge difference. And it’s not just in the clothing choices. But I think that that plays a big role in it. Whenever I wear a suit, people perceive me differently. People treat me differently, right, wrong, whatever, you wear a suit, walk into a place, it is now less common than it used to be. So people will people do treat me very differently. And sometimes, I will intentionally not wear suits, I don’t wear suits nearly as much as they used to. But I found that sometimes I was too formal, in different business settings, and I would make people a little bit uncomfortable with wearing a suit. So if I was not interested in doing that, then I wouldn’t want to wear a suit. So I didn’t do that. So clothing certainly plays a massive role in that. And again, if you’re trying to thumb your nose, at your parents or society or something else, you can dress in a way to can easily do that. A lot of different ways. If you want to blend in, you can easily do that, by wearing whatever the whatever the customary clothing, options or choices are. But it also comes down to your demeanor, obviously, your outward behavior that you are demonstrating to the world, how you are carrying yourself, your posture, the way you walk. So your gait, and your perspective and how you’re viewing the world. All of this translates in how you are presenting yourself, how you care for your body, that goes into how you are presenting yourself. So it is all of those things coming together has an impact on how you feel about yourself and how you think about yourself. And then of course, what I’ve been talking about is how other people think and feel about you. Good, bad or indifferent. These all have an impact and an effect on you and on other people. So I think that it is of value. And important to be thoughtful to be mindful of those things. And it’s easy to just get twisted up and to be trying to think about and overanalyze everything. Well, if I were this, what are people going to think of I do that What are other people going to think? And that’s something that I think is is more valuable than it is less valuable. If you want to be taken seriously, then I would recommend that you take a more formal or conservative approach. And once you make it big, once you find massive success, then perhaps you can relax and and take a different approach. Or you might be thinking, well, that’s terrible advice. I’m just going to be me, and I’m going to wear whatever I want. And, you know, I don’t care what anybody else thinks of me. And that’s fine. That is 100% your prerogative.

Just think it all the way through. So if you want to do that, if you say no, I’m just going to do me you do you and people will accept me for who I am or they won’t very well that I appreciate the that we have or that you would or that you We should ought to think it all the way through, take it to its logical conclusion. And then, once you’ve made that conscious decision to live with the results, I think that that, that I think that that is that is nothing but a good thing at that point. Fundamentally, we all work in sales. When I was hiring people, at a stage of my career, I would have some people say, Well, I just don’t want to don’t see myself in sales. And so I spent some time thinking about that. And essentially, we’re all in sales, because we’re in the business of interacting with other human beings. And we’re in the business of interacting with other human beings and oftentimes trying to bring them over to our way of thinking. So whether you are actually selling something, or you’re just trying to, you know, go to a specific restaurant, trying to get your partner or the people, you’re with your friends, to go along with your restaurant choice, you are constantly we are constantly trying to influence the other people. And how we do all the things that have been talking about certainly plays into that. And you’ve also probably heard that you only get one chance to make a first impression. And again, whether that’s true or not, I don’t know. But you probably heard that. So what impression Are you interested in making? How is it that you want to show up in the world? How do you want people to perceive you? How do you want? And how do you perceive and think and feel about yourself? Those things don’t need to be the same. There is a Johari Window thing there that we use, think about yourself versus how other people think and feel about you. Some level what people other people think of me is none of my business. And I have the opportunity to position myself for whatever level of success I am looking for and am interested in. To agree a lot of this is obvious, and very, very basic. And maybe it’s something you’re thoughtful or cognizant of. And when I look around, I just don’t see that that’s the case, though. I do not see that. That’s the case when we have one of 100 people. There’s 100, United States senators, and he in this case, John Fetterman is dressing like a I don’t even know what I’m pretty slouchy. It looks pretty slouchy. That reflects, from my perspective poorly on us, as United States it waters down the Senate, the Congress, I think it’s nothing but a negative thing. I don’t view it as positive at all. And I think it’s important that I know it’s important to have standards. And the reason that we have standards is because we want to have consistency. And so that is the reason we put in dress codes or certain rules or codes of conduct, whatever it might be. So John Fetterman deciding that he is going to just do him act the way that he acts, and everybody else is going to conform around me? Well, maybe that’s the way that it is. I don’t know. I don’t know if that rule is still in place or not. Probably should have researched that before hitting the record button, but you get the idea. Do you think that that’s right or that’s wrong? Have you spent any time thinking about it? And then how does it apply to you in your life? If it does at all? So I’ll be curious to hear your perspective on this. Once you think about it. Do you think that how you present yourself matters? Do you think that your clothing choices matter? Do you think that your demeanor matters? Do you think that your perspective matters? And how intentional are you about these things? And are these things serving us getting closer to life that you want? Or is it taking you further away, I don’t know. Food for thought something I needed to spend a bit of time thinking about myself, because I have become more casually dressed in my older age. And I don’t know if that’s a good thing or bad thing either. And certainly COVID has relaxed everything. So as we’ve been coming out of it over the past year or so or however long it’s been it gets a good time to be reflecting again and say okay, how is it that I want to be showing up in the world? What is of value to me what is important, and maybe this isn’t important at all? Or maybe it’s Very important maybe it’s more important than it ever has been or whatever you decide I want you to do your part by doing your best