June 1, 2009

“Why Be a Brand?”

I first noticed I had a nickname when people started calling to work with  “The Voice Shrink.” That was how Mickie McGowan, of animation and loop group fame referred to me.  Somehow, it stuck.

Recently another client said:

“It’s not shrinking, it’s whispering. You are “The Voice Whisperer.”

Next thing I knew, people were calling to work with “The Voice Whisperer.”

Why do we tend to give nicknames, slogans and monikers to people, events and phenomena?

Ideas and images are more readily remembered than words and statements. All communication, conceptually, is visual. Like modern art, the conceptual visual image may not follow a traditional form but our intuition, which is what modern art accesses, gets it, even if the literal brain takes longer to do so.   

When people are given a way of describing a distinction or a point of difference it becomes a container in which all other information is placed.

We need containers in which to place something new in order to anchor it, especially when it’s a concept rather than something concrete. While we are concrete as people, what creative people offer as creative is conceptual and therefore we have to help others ground the idea of us.

It’s why so much time, energy and money is spent on advertising. Not only does it bring and keep ideas on the radar, it gives us a way to first remember something and then the reasons why we should buy or embrace it.

The “whispering” aspect of my work is when I see, hear or feel through what someone is saying or doing, identifying what might be in their way and presenting it to them in such a way that they see how it might not be serving them, even if it did in the past.

Those with whom I work are on the court day in and day out and have little time for revelations to unfold over time.

What I just did, in describing a core aspect of my work, is what everyone must do: Give people a container and then the contents. Without the container, the contents can get scattered, misunderstood or worse, don’t connect at all.

The container also serves as a barometer to measure where you are along your life or career path.

Remember “The Five Operating States - Formulation, Implementation, Momentum, Stability and Breakdown/Breakthrough.

The manner in which people refer and relate to you or your work is an indication of how effective your message about you actually is. Are they seeing you the way you want to be seen? Is there a consistent reciprocity between the message you are sending out and what’s coming in?

If so, you are in Momentum.

Are you getting work above and beyond what you say about yourself and are being referred to by a moniker or even better, one word, i.e. “Don”?

Then you are in Stability.

There are and will be many with that first name, but when we say “Don” we all know who and what we mean.

When the message sent becomes a measure or sets a standard by which others are compared, you and your image belong to the culture and have transcended personhood.

That’s not something you can plan on any more than Susan Boyle planned on becoming a poster child for dreams coming true at a time when there is a premium on dreams.  It happens when there is a confluence of presence, need and opportunity.

You can’t plan on it, but sending clear, precise messages with vivid verbal or visual images of your point of view is a great start.

When it does happen, it‘s yours to give away, in gratitude and with humility.

By honoring the gift you’ve been given, you inspire others to do the same.

mt

February 1, 2009

“21/21: The New Standard of Vision for the Millennium”

A sociologist at heart, I believe the context in which any message lives is as important as the content. It is especially crucial for those in entertainment and broadcasting to have a greater sense of the temper and tone of the times in order to effectively deliver messages.

One of my pet theories is that no decade begins or ends on time. We made Time up. We made Finite Time up, that is. Finite Time is the kind of Time that has a beginning and an end. We said when Finite Time started. Some think they know when it will end. I think not. Read on.

Infinite Time, which is just that, must look at us with great bewilderment. But humans are finite (i.e. we have a corporal expiration date) so we think that the container (Time) in which we hold our experience must also be finite. Things were happening well before we came along. They will continue long after we move on down the road. It’s just plain arrogant for us to give names and demarcations to that which is not only bigger and more complex than our primitive intellects can fathom and then think the rest of the Soup agrees with us. What about all the other beings in other solar systems, revolving around other suns who are determining their futures based on their position to the stars they contemplate each night?  Are their days and nights the same length as ours? If their Sun is bigger or smaller than ours, I‘m thinking no.  It’s all made up based on whatever criteria works for them. That’s their Finite Time.

So, Finite Time is relative. It shapes our experience because it’s based on how we feel.

When we all feel a certain way, it’s been called The Collective Unconscious. I personally don’t think it’s that entire unconscious, but it is more collective than ever before. I prefer to call it The Emotional Grid; that part of our essence that is plugged in the way computers are plugged into the Internet.  We shape Finite Time via The Emotional Grid. When we are ready to shift to a different way of being, our feelings organize around our readiness and that’s when things happen.

Feelings become thought. Thought sets energy into motion. Energy in motion becomes experience.

As we approached the year 2000, there was a lot said and done to make us feel like we were crossing some sort of Great Demarcation. But did we really feel it? Well, maybe the French, but they’re another story altogether. The rest of us, not so much.

Y2K anyone? We were told that when the calendar flipped to 2000 our computers would flip out and we would be back thumping on drums to communicate?  Didn’t happen. Why? We weren’t interested. The Emotional Grid said “No, thank you” so it didn’t happen.  Nor did the Millennium.

 Oh, we had parties and shot off fireworks and built museums, time capsules and ferris wheels but we weren’t there yet. It took eight more years for the 20^th Century to come to an end.

It officially ended on November 7, 2008.

The 20th Century ended, for the entire planet, on Election Day in the United States?  Yes.

Tell me, in your lifetime, when did you feel the sense of something shifting, at your core, on such a global level, as you did on November 7th?

Doesn’t matter which way you voted. Something shifted. We let go of the 20^th Century and all that led up to its dubious conclusion on November 7, 2008 and began making ready for the arrival of the 21^st Century… on January 21, 2009.

What supreme arrogance is it that I, an American, can say that Finite Time revolves around us?

It would be supreme arrogant if I was making it up. But, I’m not.

It’s the Emotional Grid making that call.

The Emotional Grid, like all social orders, needs an Alpha Dog.

So yes, I am pinning the whole shift from last century narcissism to this century’s burgeoning sense of global consciousness on the changing of the guard in our country. So is the rest of the world.

For better or worse, the planet has chosen us, or as one social philosopher said:

“ If America didn’t exist, we would have had to invent it ”.

We have to come back and we have to come back fast and strong.

It’s our job and our role in the world.

There are five stages in the process by which ideas move into action and action then becomes tangible.  They are called The Five Operating States. The first four states are: Formulation, Implementation, Momentum and Stability. We are in the fifth stage, called Break-Down/Break-Through. Unfortunately, Breakdown most often precedes Break-Through because it seems to be the only way to get our attention.

It took horrific events, beginning with 9/11 and culminating in the plethora of game-changing nightmares that we now face for us to wake up and start stepping up.

How does this effect us?

We are the messengers.

 If we don’t get it, no one else will.

mt