Virtual Assistance and You

Categorizing and marketing

When it comes to your relationships, your clients, your colleagues, contacts, and suppliers, it’s tempting to categorize them and set up automated systems based on assumptions or aggregate descriptives about them.

The possibility of categorizing – i.e., labeling groups of people with certain shared characteristics – has triggered the past century or so in advertising. Some Henry Ford idea of standardization has blinded us to anything else but a mechanized version of human life.

But people are not essentially mechanistic. Our differences are both subtle and enormous.

Do you judge rather than serve?

Are you positively paralyzed by the fracas over the “Ground Zero” Muslim community center? Could we possibly be more splintered, more divided than we are over this issue? (The whole thing makes me sad.)

I realize I have a palpable fear of certain political viewpoints. I am actually afraid of those who espouse certain affiliations. I feel threatened by them.

These realizations cause me to re-assess. To have such extreme responses bodes no good. I am believing in my categories instead of perceiving the individuality of every moment, person, and situation.

Do you agree that there is a difference here?

You can hold to the hard line, insisting that everything can be categorized; or you can open to the reality that there is no categorization, that every instance is unique.

The tools for service

It is, of course, a lot easier to sort things into boxes and deal with them in bulk. But real life, nature, and the environment around us all suggest that it’s a lot more complicated than that. Especially when it comes to other people, shortcuts created by generalizing are costly if not completely destructive.

So thank goodness for social media, giving us the means by which to address our ‘public’ one by one. The technology has an uncanny way of expressing solutions to needs we hardly knew we had! But our need to serve rather than judge surely preceded the internet’s explosion.

That thing you do …

The old ‘billboard’ outbound marketing had to die. People do not want to be categorized, so any system that perpetrates categorization is doomed from the start. People want to be seen in their individuality, and it is the extent to which you can convince them you see them accordingly that you win their trust, and patronage.

Applying this maxim to the continual search for my ideal client, it becomes clear that there’s no final definition of that elusive personality. The person who resonates best with me may actually fit a multitude of ‘profile’ types. I can no more hope to predict the type than I can resolve the “Ground Zero Mosque” question.

Ultimately, que sera, sera, right? If I be what I be, you be what you be, and we meet through the internet or anywhere, then you are my ideal client. At least until proven otherwise.

People are at their best when using their native gifts. The fat person who dances beautifully; the gentleman who becomes a farmer; the introvert who inspires millions: these are examples of the deliciously contradictory nature of personality. One’s native gifts are not defined by others because they can often contradict outward appearances. We each must find our own core skills.

Always, my thinking stems from the assumption that every sentient being has something to offer by way of helping others. To be alive and whole is to share and empathize.

But identifying your core skills is not easy. A great many of us forever remain blind to the best uses of our energies.

Those who do identify their native gifts and use them for the benefit of others have the opportunity to live harmoniously and with relative ease. Examples might be a someone who loves cooking and writes cookbooks; or someone who is a natural public speaker and delivers speeches for a living. Or perhaps someone who is an expert housekeeper and works cleaning houses.

A large portion of the workforce have no idea what their core skills are, or never consider the question. They’re just glad to have a job. Generally, no one questions it: individuals fit into job descriptions; job descriptions do not change to fit individuals.

Increasingly, however, alongside disillusionment with corporate careers, many are copping a new paradigm. They are responding to a new imperative, one that echoes from inside their deepest dreams as well as down the canyons of social need today. It’s a sort of desperation, maybe: finally we turn to our inner selves for answers, all else having failed.

Creating a job means you have done all the homework of self -and-other research, consciously building a livelihood from your core abilities.  It means you have approached the challenge of making a living from the perspective of compassion, as opposed to the perspective of self-protection. You  have figured out how to translate your talents into gifts.

But what are your talents, and how can they be configured as gifts? It worries me that discovering your answers may take most, if not all of your working life. But perhaps, if you start searching right now, you’ll find the answer just around the corner.

I would be honored if you’d share your story about defining right livelihood in your life. Please comment!

This blog has a modest readership, and I gather that most of you are fellow virtual assistants.  If you’re not a VA, you probably work with VAs or you’re looking into working with one. Whichever of these categories defines you, it’s likely that you’re a solopreneur, or at least an entrepreneur, working your buns off to realize a dream.

Most of my clients are people involved in work that is close to their heart. They may have had previous employment in corporate circles or other organizations, but now they are committed to realizing the best expression of themselves, the best gifts they can make to life.

Usually people don’t work up the gumption to go into business for themselves until later in life, if at all. But since our economy is so fragile, more peeps nowadays are leaving the corporations to venture out on the high wire of their native proclivities, presuming to make a living through in-depth experience of whatever thing(s) they are passionate about. The risk involves blood, sweat, and tears; and then the simple heaven of knowing you gave it your best shot. You might succeed and you might not, but you will not wonder what if.

Most VAs will know what I mean, because we are business owners who usually start out as solo efforts, whether we stay there or not. We know what it is to depend on your own belief in yourself.

There are so many others, as well, who will relate to the compelling drive to find their best expression, who do not want to settle for what others want them to be. It takes a lot of courage to stop working a safe job in favor of doing something that comes more naturally to you. A barrage of ancient rules and taboos gets in the way, not to mention the paralyzing fear of loss.

Being who you most profoundly are, submitting to the vision quest in search of how your core self can be most useful to both your self and your fellow human beings, requires huge strength and ongoing faith. It’s certainly not the easy way out.

The current limelight on branding as a concern of every individual shows that the trend towards increased self-employment is not just a blip on the radar. Personal branding is about taking responsibility for the chain of events that is your career, both where you plan to end up, and every step on the way. It’s your life, not your boss’ or your father’s or some other leader’s. You are the center of your universe. Because of this, strengthening your core skills is always in your best interest.

Many don’t recognize a core skill apart from their daily work as it is. But for those who feel a disconnect between their occupation and their compassionate pre-occupation, proceeding to your own business or practice is inevitable.

And if you’re on that road, it’s my advice to do all you can to find company. Seek out places where you can find others similarly realizing their dreams, who can support and sustain you. It could make all the difference.

I’ve been working administratively since 1973. Through nearly all of that time, the ideal of the multi-tasker was held up as the highest achievement. If administration is carrying out the dictates of the planners, multi-tasking is the best way to serve their lofty ideals, because it makes several employees out of one, and gets the job done no matter what.

And anyway, it’s a high. When you’re responding to demands from many quarters at once, you’re dancing. Flit here, pause there, do a pirouette and end up on top.

Multi-tasking is endlessly entertaining, while you accomplish the oft-labeled-impossible task of serving many masters all at the same time.

But it never lasts. Have you noticed? The one constant in multi-tasking is burn-out. The nerves fray, the attention eventually wanders.

So how can we benefit from multi-tasking without fizzling like firecrackers?

By applying it consciously, rather than compulsively.

The business person who is always tracking several threads at once and therefore never available for focused,  eyeball-to-eyeball experiences is useless 99% of the time.  You know who you are.

This is not to dispense with multi-tasking altogether. Using it to take care of mundane responsibilities can be tremendously helpful. But continuing to multi-task when your activities lead you into realms of personal contact, decision-making, or any higher-level thought can be detrimental to growth.

Note that multi-tasking can be addictive. It’s also admired, in a general sense, so the addict is encouraged in  his/ her affliction every day, in a vicious cycle that few people understand or even realize. I’m thinking of one friend who is actually successful in business.  But she won’t become any more successful than she is; she will stay at her current level, because she’s addicted to multi-tasking.

To multi-task in a conscious way means that you can turn it on and off at will. It means whenever you are with another person, you turn it off, because when you multi-task while communicating in person, you give the other less than their due respect. We owe one another more than that, no matter who the other is. In person (or in direct one-on-one conversation of any kind), focus is key and without it you risk being offensive.

As in my friend’s case, multi-tasking leads to negligence in other areas of life, often the personal needs that are ignored while you Accomplish with phenomenal speed and acumen.  It’s these suppressed urges that eventually demand your surrender. Just because you can juggle like a wiz doesn’t mean you’re entitled to sainthood.

Though you may think it hard to believe, life is even more multi than multi-tasking.

So how are your dreams these days?

I’ve often wondered why we don’t more persistently seek the meaning and uses of dreams. Is there any more accurate barometer of health and heart? If you keep a journal of your dreams, they may seem nonsensical when you write them down, but when you read them later you begin to make connections and see the messages that are being shared.

Taking into conscious consideration the value of sleep and dreaming can increase your feeling of balance and well-being. Respecting your need for a full night’s rest – and more, respecting the perceptions that happen during that time – can help you live more holistically, and better interpret your experiences. I liked a report I read the other day that suggested that naps may increase your ability to process and store information, if you dream while napping.

When starting out in the working world, we’re encouraged to follow our dreams, but that reference is to day dreams. Rarely is anyone urged to give value to their night dreams. Of course, if you’re psychotic, or depressed, or otherwise troubled, dreams may be part of a necessary soul search.

But what I’m advocating here is nothing so harrowing. Rather, I’m suggesting using dreams on a daily basis in normal life. Allow your subconscious a place in your awareness. Reflect on its images and use them to understand your waking experiences.

If that’s too ethereal for you, allow me to take a wider perspective. Because the larger point here is that Time Out is not an indulgence: it is essential to success.  It’s the yin of dreaming to the yang of doing. We ignore its importance at our peril.

Taking a break, napping, sleeping, going for a walk, using that good old Time Out is a fundamental best practice, no matter what you’re doing. Entrepreneurs and artists often have trouble controlling their drive. There’s a grim sort of glory in wearing yourself out. But notice that it doesn’t last.

Brilliance so often appears when we’re not looking. Your fierce, stubborn focus, your killer drive to the bitter end is pitiful when compared to the ease and perfection of accomplishment when you apply both your attention and your dreams.

You don’t necessarily dream the answer to your problems, or conjure up some failsafe get-rich scheme; I’m not saying you’ll have a premonition of bad stuff coming down, or dream what stock to purchase for big wins. You will, though, enjoy a new clarity about your involvements, as well as grow your creativity and compassion.

You’ll find that you feel rich, no matter what your bank account says.

Did you miss me? We’ve just returned from a full two-week holiday. Not that I can afford such things, but my dear partner is a generous soul. He treated me to all the delights of Culebra, a small island off the northeast coast of Puerto Rico. We slept and swam and snorkeled; we ate and drank and read novels and lounged like proper spoiled Americans on vacation.

I left my computer at home. The hardest work I did was sweeping out our sweet little bay side room.

Such a hiatus is certainly healthy. Yet I must admit to a certain unease that hung about the edges of my days there. A certain haunting sense that I don’t care all that much for such indulgences, that I should be back at my desk. A longing, actually, to return to the grind.

Yet no such sensations accompanied me on any holiday I have ever enjoyed in the past. Previously, I’ve always dreaded returning to work, clinging passionately to the vacation and detesting its end.

There are clear reasons for the difference this time. Primarily, I’m working for myself and I love my involvements and clients. My thirst for learning through the internet appears insatiable. For the first time in my old life, the creative possibilities seem endless.

It’s a strange sensation. Could it be that work can be so satisfying, so meaningful that Caribbean holidays pale in comparison? Well, perhaps that’s extreme.

But shouldn’t we all generally tend to such a state: one in which the value of a normal day ranks right up there with our sweetest enjoyments?

I’m not wealthy, or materially successful, but this feeling makes me think I’ve at last achieved a lofty pinnacle of accomplishment. At long last, everyday life is as rich as a holiday, a holy day, a day in which to rejoice and be glad.

What about you? I’d like to hear about it if you’ve also experienced this new sensation.