Here are more highlights from Seth Godin’s event in Atlanta last Friday.  My comments are in italics.

The Lizard
There is a part of your brain genetically wired to protect you. It’s the part that causes you to get nervous when you see a shark fin in the water. Lizards have the same thing because it keeps them alive (This is why Godin calls it “The Lizard”). Another way to describe The Lizard is “The Resistance” (I don’t recall who he said that was from).

This protective part of our brain responds the same way when our status quo is threatened or when we try to do something that makes us uncomfortable.

Fight The Resistance! Fail on purpose! Try to connect, innovate, and take a risk! Fail, succeed, then go to your boss and say,”Look what I did.” They don’t want another cog in the wheel. They want an innovator and a risk-taker. If they don’t, then go elsewhere.

Anxiety is simply experiencing failure in advance over and over in your mind.

I wonder how many world-changing ideas have been snuffed out by the fear of unknown results?  It’s good to think through an idea and know your positives and negatives. But in my case, I often leave an idea on the table because of the unanswered questions that always come with starting something that involves risk. I think it’s time to start experiencing a little more healthy failure.

Leadership
Leadership is really scary because people may not show up at the march. Don’t wait for what is next. Do your idea. Now.

The danger of being a wandering generality. Its easy to start a thing, and then another thing. Pressing through with one thing all the way to execution (shipping) is the difficult and rare part.  Leaders do this, regardless of their title.

What’s the algorithm for determining the best ideas? Knowing what your goals are helps a ton, but what matters more is actually making a decision.  Set a deadline for picking an idea, and do it. If you cant do it, then your indecision is only “The Resistance” talking.

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Seth’s event energized me on many fronts, but his comments about fear were the most powerful, because I’ve had a tendency to procrastinate on developing and bringing ideas to execution.

Procrastination is a word that could be much better explained in terms of fear. Planning on doing something in three years? Unless you are doing things now that are moving you in that direction then it’s bullshit. You aren’t doing anything in three years unless you are doing something now. If you aren’t doing anything now, then this stuff about ” three years from now” is the voice of The Resistance.

Godin has inspired me to create a counter-resistance to fear.  Who knows where it could lead?