Becoming 6% more awesome

“What do you think is a top score (out of 10) in gymnastics” my mentor on the other side of the table asked me, knowing it would not be 10 I said 9.5, he said “9.4, so what do you think creates the perfect score Cam, what measures are the other 6%?” The other 6% for achieving a perfect score is the measure of originality, risk and virtuosity (what makes you).

Originality, risk and virtuosity are things we have loads of when we start anything, they are are the components that release endorphins within us, that inspire us to dream…believe…and achieve.

It is originality, risk and virtuosity that gets us into rooms and moments of excellence and reinforces some powerful words that I was told as a teenager “difference is a good thing – the people who count in this world look for those who are different”. But what can happen and therefore limit us is that we get comfortable with the skills that we have developed and stop having faith in…well… what makes us…us, the 6% that got us started, that got us winning in life doesn’t release the same endorphins anymore because everything has become a part of what is expected.

When this happens a multitude of results can occur, some good, some not so good:

  1. We become secure and confident but steady, therefore there are no more dramatic stages of progression.
  2. We feel pressure that makes us responsive and impulsive which can become destructive, we want to be very careful of this.
  3. We continue to exceed expectations but to get this we need originality, risk and virtuosity

Number 3 is what creates legends, number 3 is what leaves a legacy, number 3 is inspired, it’s what sees a company like Apple go from computers, to computers and music, to computers, music and phones. Number 3 is what sees a band producing unforgettable songs on every release, or an athlete been unbeaten for a record amount of time, because although they have the base to their business, music, sport…their skills… they are continually looking for the 6% that they can change – the 6% that sees them retaining perfection.

Wherever we are and wherever we are going we we need to review and change 6% of what we do, now that’s not a lot but it does require a lot, it requires us to have a dream, to believe in that dream, to never stop dreaming and within that continue to look for ways to be original (take your partner somewhere you’ve never been), to take risk (make that phone call / host that event), and to embrace / leverage everything that makes you…you…you are awesome….awesomeness is what we buy, share and remember!

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