***Note - This post originally appeared on Medium (https://medium.com/@justinstarbird)***
3 Minute Read
Just finished watching the #AskGaryVee Show hosted by Gary Vaynerchuck with guest Seth Godin.
Seth Godin — Marketing Thought Leader & Author of several NYT Best Sellers including, Permission Marketing
Totally blown away with the amount of time that can be wasted in a day. When you look at where you spend your time, how you spend your time, and why you spend your time on certain topics, it spells out the reason you are where you are in life.
At this juncture, there is no excuse for not contributing to society where ever your skills sets are strong. When you work a ‘regular job; 8 hours a day, there is more then enough time in your life to continue to work on passions. When you’re grinding on work, topics, or issues that are important to you, it is no longer work.
Gary Vaynerchuck — Entrepreneur, Author, Host, Realist, — New book #AskGaryVee comes out March 8th.
Put the remote down. Stop “Liking” posts on Facebook, or using the “Angry” button, stop retweeting and using hearts on Instagram. Use the same time you’re using scrolling to participate.
Participation is like currency. When you participate in something, you get rewarded. If you’re there for a child, they grow up to be a better person. If you participate in the development of a project, the project will realize more success. For those that say projects or products fail, the reality is that when the failure is realized, a solution can be born. Often times failure is seen as a bad thing. The problem is that failure is rarely given context.
When you started a company based on an idea and you failed to get it off the ground, that means something different to different people. Was MYSPACE a failure? If you were using it in 2003–2004, it was a resounding success! It wasn’t until the platform failed to pivot to compete with the new kid on the block — FACEBOOK — that it began to fail. Although it is not even close to the popularity it was 10 years ago, technically the platform still lives. So was it really a failure?
When Henry Ford created the assembly line, another business owner had just purchased 500 horses for drawn carriages. That person was not looking for a solution. They were happy with status quo. In our lives, we all know of things that could be done in a better way. More efficiently, more quickly, cleaner, clearer, solutions abound. But if you don’t speak up with a new idea, it is the same debating whether a tree that falls in the woods makes a sound if no one is there to hear it.
These failures were preceded by participation. Therefore, participation also equals experience.
Experience, no matter how it comes to life, adds value to future results. I really, if you make a mistake, you will not make that same mistake again and zig when before you may have zagged. If you take this experience and it adds value to what you’re doing, you immediately become more valuable where you’re experience can be drawn on. Thereby participating equates to currency.
At the end of the day, participation determines whether you feel like you’re successful or not.
Start participating and make today successful for you and those it supports. Thank You #SethGodin & #GaryVaynerchuck.
Justin Starbird — CEO, The Aebli Group, Participating Husband, Father, Brother, Son, Friend
