“I look for what needs to be done. After all, that’s how the universe designs itself.” -R. Buckminster Fuller
What is the difference between self promotion and just sharing great ideas with people?
The difference is authenticity.
I just went to a local Christian sponsored presentation on internet job hunting. The speaker enthusiastically suggested spending 11-15 hours each week on a personal blog solely for networking purposes.
“Be careful about what kind of online image you create”, she warned.
“But isn’t there an issue of personal integrity if I am portraying an image?” one attendee asked.
The speaker bizarrely failed to make the connection; she insisted that integrity is a personal issue, not an issue with networking sites.
How out of sync is the corporate world with our actual character when we spend 10, 15 hours a week fabricating a “professional” self? This is starting to sound a bit like Scientology, where someone glamorizes their spiritual level at all costs, lest they deny themselves the funds they desperately need from those “lower down”.
Of course a certain realization graces a few Scientologists. An insight strikes into consciousness:
I actually don’t know what I’m doing here.
I am actually not happy.
For others the public image so pervades their actions that they never consciously disengage from the staged identity. Self delusion renders them self righteous spiritual masters.
Herein lies the danger of censoring a personal blog or conversations on networking sites. You cannot practice selective self censorship. That is, if you spend half your time emulating an “acceptable” image, what is going to happen? You start losing the capacity for actual self acceptance.
How can you express love or openness when you are not a person, but a make-believe personality? How can you fully embrace someone whilst hiding yourself? Furthermore, what happens to intelligence and creativity when certain areas of thought are off limits?
Maybe a conservative CEO could give me an honest answer.
If you liked this post, buy me a drink (suggestion: $2 for pot of green gunpowder tea).
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January 26th, 2009 at 11:42 pm
Great observations! Thank you for sharing.
February 23rd, 2009 at 3:14 am
I thought about that a couple of times while sharing stuff in my blog and decided that I don’t give a damn. Fun is to be yourself, nothing else. And that’s why I left the corporate world. It’s all image, nobody is really interested in authenticity, which in fact is curtailed as not “appropriate”. What happens to creativity? Look around, American culture is in the toilet. People are afraid to say what they think and of sharing — their lives, their opinion, their time. And the top of boredom is a gray cube inside one of the corporate offices of America. Here’s to a life of Creative Idleness, as says Domenico De Masi!
February 23rd, 2009 at 3:02 pm
I completely agree with this insight. “Creating” a “professional” image used to bug me in doing a resume and now it bugs me in networking. One thing I like about blogging is that I’m not paid for it and can be myself. I can be as outspoken as I want, but I can also learn to be genuine while still leaning toward the positive and offering information others might be able to use. Rather than trying to craft a public image I try to expose my “best self.”
February 24th, 2009 at 3:12 am
Good point Fran. But don’t you think that even when we are being paid, we’re still allowed to be ourselves and speak our minds, assuming we’re being respectful of others? Because otherwise we’re just selling our souls for money (or other), and literally that’s how I felt in a lot of my jobs and with some groups. (actually that’s how I feel generally in this country: censored.)