I have never known a rebel who was boring. ~ www.jaywren.com
Rebels: Companies have guidelines and rules. But what do you do when the guidelines no longer provide you security? Do you have enough of the rebel in you to change your life and, perhaps, even the lives of people around you?
Rebels: Is Conforming to the System Killing Your Career?
Following policies and procedures works great for the average person. They go to work on time and do what the company asks. To the best of their ability, they try to get along with everyone.
But what if you are tired of being average? What if you want to break out of the mold in a bold and dynamic way?
Furthermore, what if you want to change your life and change the lives of the people around you?
Every Pathway Involves Risks.
There are people who have great careers. They work at a company for twenty or thirty years. Some of these people are fortunate enough to move on to another great job. Others have the good fortune of being able to retire early.
For other people, the life of the average person moves along fine until they find that their company no longer needs them and discover it is too late in life to recover.
Then the most secure pathway of conformity becomes the riskiest. As they reach their forties and fifties, many still have families to support, perhaps even have the expense of sending their children to college.
However, now, they end up in hourly jobs for far less money. Others end up doing gigs with no security all.
Rebels Create Change.
Some great rebels of the 19th and 20th century changed the way the world does things and received enormous rewards for those changes.
Inventors from Thomas Edison to Edwin Land were rebels. Thomas Edison held more patents than any other person. Edwin Land is second in terms of holding the most patents.
Steve Jobs admired Land for the bold moves that Land made to create new products and build a company around them. Jobs referred to Land as a “troublemaker.”
Steve Jobs was no less a rebel. He left Apple in 1985 over disputes with the board of directors. At the time, perhaps no one could imagine Steve Jobs returning to Apple. But in 1997, he did return. In his own rebellious way, he redirected a failing company and turned it into the most valuable company in the world.
Tim Ferriss had made a career of doing things differently. He took a laptop, created a WordPress website, wrote four best-selling books, and now has one of the most popular podcasts on the Internet. Ferris has over 940,000 people who follow him on LinkedIn. He characterizes his message as “experiments in lifestyle design.” To many people, he is the leading pioneer of the new economy. In his book, The Four-Hour Workweek, he describes the lifestyle of the “new rich.”
Rebels Find Success Through Their Authenticity.
It is their struggle for authenticity that makes the rebels different. Furthermore, they reject the restrictions that run counter to their view of authenticity.
The simple writing style of Ernest Hemingway, the descriptive writing style of F. Scott Fitzgerald, the complex writing style of William Faulkner, and the clever, witty writing style of J.D. Salinger are all different.
Their styles were not only different from the style of each other. Their styles were different from the styles of any other writers. All four adhered to their idea of authenticity in their writing.
As do all rebels, these writers have their authenticity in common.
Comments are closed.