About a week ago, Seth Godin had a short but powerful post on his blog titled, Find Your Voice.
A really great post…
I write about this idea quite often… since it’s something I’ve worked on a lot, both as a musician and a marketer.
Before you find your voice, you spend your time doing what you think are the right things you need to do to create results.
When you find your voice… it’s almost like magic. Because that’s when you start doing the things you need to do… simply because you need to do them. When you start saying the things you need to say, for no other reason than to have them be heard.
You disconnect from the results and focus on the doing.
Oddly enough, that’s when the results seem to come more easily and more quickly than ever.
Here’s an example of what finding your voice means in the music world.
The two videos below are recordings of the 3rd movement of Bach’s Concerto for Oboe and Violin (that’s BWV 1060 if you’re a music nerd). My wife and I played this in a recital with some friends when we lived in NYC. It’s a great piece.
The first video is a fairly traditional interpretation of the movement. It sounds nice… but in the end, isn’t all that memorable.
Take a listen:
The video below features violinist Nigel Kennedy.
Now if there’s one thing that can be said about Nigel Kennedy, it’s that he’s not boring.
And that’s because he has found his voice. He knows what he stands for and his voice comes through.
Some people don’t like that. Especially when he takes a piece like the one you’re about to hear and does what he wants with it.
Some critics will say it’s too fast… just a terrible hack job. Others will call him a genius.
The type of comment doesn’t matter. The fact that his music prompts the comment is what matters.
Take a listen and see what you hear.
What do you think would happen to your business if you found your voice and got it out into the marketplace?
I bet good things would happen.
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