your daily rock : just be you

August 23, 2013 in Daily Rock, General

I did a big diversity training program for a large global corporation years ago. We trained in pairs, and every time I was paired with Miguel, I watched how effortlessly he made people laugh and get excited–and I longed for that. My style was so unlike his, and I longed to be more like him in the training room: Energetic and bouncy and expressive!

One session, paired with someone else, I decided to imitate Miguel’s style.

Total flop. For me, and for the participants.

I’m not Miguel. And he’s not me. And the fact is that trying to be like him was a lot of work and would always fail.

When I started giving keynote speeches, I thought I should be moving around the stage, gesturing a lot like Tony Robbins.

Thankfully, I decided to show up as I am.

Just be you. You are awesome because you are the only you there is. Your ordinary is amazing.

Love,

(These beautifully painted rocks are created by Kim Mailhot, aka The Rock Fairy.

About Patti Digh

Patti Digh is an author, speaker, and educator who builds learning communities and gets to the heart of difficult topics. Her work over the last three decades has focused on diversity, inclusion, social justice, and living and working mindfully. She has developed diversity strategies and educational programming for major nonprofit and corporate organizations and has been a featured speaker at many national and international conferences.