Michael Anthony was a part-time magician, performing at parties and local schools, but he dreamed of being a professional stage-hypnotist. He had an insatiable appetite for hypnotism. He devoured loads of books about the intriguing subject. He'd practice it a bit on his friends; little things, like "Clasp your hands together. Now, when I snap my fingers your hands will be bound together with the world's strongest adhesive." And he could get these small hypnotic suggestions to work. But Michael was strictly a part-time magician, superb at sleight of hand tricks, until the day he met a man whose friend was the activities director for a local college. "I'll recommend you to her," the man said. "Tell her I'm a hypnotist," Michael replied.
The woman contacted Michael to inquire about his hypnotism act. Michael convinced her it was great. They agreed on a price of $750, which would be more than Michael had ever made for his magic. Michael got off the phone and got scared. He'd never hypnotized anyone, except for his friends, who might have just been playing along for all he knew. And he'd never tried the more daring hypnotic suggestions that comprise a stage act; suggestions like, "When I say jungle, you'll leap out of your chair, beat your chest and yell like Tarzan." (You can't practice these kinds of suggestions on your friends because your friends think of you too much as, well... just their friend, and not some person with hypnotic power). Michael had read about how to do them - he just hadn't had the chance to do them. Despite his lack of hypnotism experience, he'd just made a $750 promise to someone that he could do it.
The day of the engagement arrived. In the shower that morning Michael felt sick. The pressure was killing him. He wanted to cancel. "What if I say, "Jungle," and the guy just sits there??" "What if nothing but the glued hands works??" "What if even that flops??" He knew he could relieve his torturous anxiety by canceling, and he knew he could say he was sick. But he didn't cancel. In his own words, he thought to himself, "Michael, you've wanted this chance for years now. This is what you've been working for."
Michael arrived at the engagement and opted to not let anyone know how nervous and scared he was on the inside. Smiling on the outside; dying on the inside. He hadn't allowed any of his friends to attend. If he failed miserably, he didn't want one more person over the 300 in attendance to witness it- especially not a friend he'd have to face the next day. His moment of truth arrived. His volunteers were on the stage and he'd gone through the steps of induction, which hopefully put the volunteers under his command. Then he selected his first subject, a balding man, and said, "When I say jungle, you'll leap out of your chair, beat your chest and yell like Tarzan." As Michael said the words, he thought to himself, "I really, really hope you will." Then he bantered with the audience for a moment - 300 people waiting to see if hypnotism really worked. He could stall no longer. He turned to the balding man -and said, "Mmm, it feels like a Jungle in here." "Please God," Michael prayed. The man leapt out of his seat, beat his chest and let out a roar fit for the Amazon. Michael actually was a hypnotist. His show went great.
Fake it 'til you make it, they say.
The co-founders of Microsoft, Bill Gates and Paul Allen, faked it 'til they made it. They were both in college at Harvard when an announcement of the world's first personal computer, the Altair, hit the cover of an electronics magazine. The Altair worked, but it didn't have its own programming language. Bill and Paul called the personal computer maker and told him they already had a programming language that worked on his new machine. In fact they didn't; only confidence that they could write it given a few months. They told him they'd come to Albuquerque when they had a semester break. Then they worked 'round the clock for two months making one up that they could only hope would work on the Altair, since after all, they didn't have a unit to test it on. It was decided that Paul Allen should be the one to travel to Albuquerque for the test - since he was the better programmer of the two; in case something went wrong. Paul's moment of truth arrived. He fed the language into the Altair (in those days, a long and careful process of switching switches). With the language in, it was time to press a button and see if it would work. He hoped for a green light and... got it. Bill and Paul were in business as programmers.
Everyone's got a moment of bravado, a time when they were trying to become something more, and hoping not to fall flat on their face. It's called faking it 'til you make it and it's a damn good approach. Take chances on yourself. Give yourself opportunities to rise to the occasion. Life is a confidence game, and even confidence can be faked once-in-a-while. You don't always need to be 100% certain in your ability to "pull-it-off." As long as you believe you might be able to pull it off, and you're willing to try despite the risk of embarrassment, you can fake like you're 100% certain. Then people will give you a chance. Worse case scenario: You bomb. So what? Risk takers bomb all the time, and yet there is not a single reported case of death by humiliation (Minor colds and flu - yes - but no deaths).
In order to do something you've never done before, you usually have to fake it 'til you make it, because you just don't win opportunities to do your dream with words like, "I've never actually done it before, but I'm praying I can pull it off." It's no crime to fake it in the beginning. If it were, you'd have to lock up just about every successful person in the world. It's a crime to not give yourself the chance to pull off a brave triumph.
Faking it doesn't mean falsely representing yourself. If you think there's no way in hell you could pull it off, then you've got no business telling someone you can. That would be "fake it until you break it." You don't need the Bill for Damages. Fake it 'til you make it means feeling pretty sure on the inside that you could pull it off given the opportunity, while expressing "piece of cake," to those that guard the gate. In order to feel pretty sure that you could pull it off the key strategy is preparation, preparation, preparation and a bit more preparation. But you can't prepare forever. You have to step out of your house before you're perfect and confidently announce to the world, "I can do it, most certainly." You have to put yourself to the test.
[Author's note: People who should not fake it until they make it: Pilots, surgeons, carnival knife throwers, and so forth. Outside of the category, "Professions that have other people's lives in danger," you pretty much have to fake it at some point to see what you can do.]
Until next week, be greater (even if you have to fake it a bit). |
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"You only live once. But if you live right, once is enough."
"Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to save it."
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
"The irony is that the person NOT taking risks feels the same amount of fear. The non-risk taker simply feels the same fear over more trivial things."
-Peter McWilliams & John-Rogers
"Everybody wants to be somebody; nobody wants to grow."
-Goethe (1749-1832)
"You may be afraid if you try, but you're doomed if you don't try."
Beverly Sills
"Half the game is 90% mental."
Yogi Berra
"If a man will begin in certainties he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin in doubts he shall end in certainties."
-Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
"Apply yourself. Get all the education you can, but then, by God, do something. Don't just stand there, make it happen."
- Lee Iacocca, Chairman, Chrysler Motors |
