Show Me, Don't Tell Me

There is an old Rush song on their Presto album called "Show me don't tell me" (see the Youtube video). The title of this song is the perfect fit for this post which could be titled "Arrogance vs. Self Assurance", but "show me don't tell me" seemed to fit so much better, because this post is just another facet to being alpha.

I know that a running theme in this blog is having an alpha status (alpha male, but male has nothing to do with it). And part of having an alpha status is understanding that showing qualities is the only thing that counts, and telling of good qualities not only doesn't ring true to others, but demonstrates insecurities.

Alright, so this theme has been flying around my interactions quite a bit lately. In fact, just being aware (which will be the subject of a future post) of showing and not telling, has been a big part of last week. It seems that many people are constantly telling me how wonderful they are: how smart, how charming, how good looking, how adventurous, how driven, how passionate, how successful, how rich, how determined ... but the mere fact that they are telling me implies that they are not any of those things. In fact people who are good looking, charming, smart, successful, wealthy, determined, spend their time being those things and don't spend their time talking about it.

As is typical of my analysis, if you push something to it's limit you can get an interesting thought experiment, so let's push this: George Clooney, Hugh Jackman, Angelina Jolie, and all the other good looking actors in Hollywood, don't spend time telling you how attractive they are. In fact they are rather shy. Rather they simply show up and people quickly figure out they are attractive ... and ALPHA.

ALPHA's ... ie leaders of the pack ... don't have to tell you they are XXX, they simply are XXX and it shows through.

So, here is the question of the week:

"How do I make sure that people see I'm XXX (which is being self-assured) and not tell people I'm XXX (which is being arrogant)?"

Simple. Make sure to let people know what you've accomplished in a simple and non-pretentious way and they will quickly understand where you fall in the pack. Let me give you a couple of examples:

* If you want people to know you are smart, then create, post, write, lecture, blog about interesting topics

* If you want people to know you are good looking then dress in style, go to events where you'll be seen, take fashion chances

* If you want people to know you are driven, then make sure that you accomplish many things that are difficult for others

Basically if you want to be remarkable, then do remarkable things (see my previous post on being remarkable).

Or better yet if you are truly alpha, then just simply do those things and don't worry about anyone else knowing you are doing them. Just doing them is enough for you.

See you on the wire

- Steven Cardinale