Ever since I started pursuing my life work in earnest – the calling as a life coach, writer, speaker, and facilitator aimed at being a positive force for people – I have heard “become an expert in your field.”
“Be the one journalists will call on for expertise.”
“Practice positive self-promotion as THE expert to count on for solutions to your perfect client’s problems.”
I can see the value in all of this and yet I’ve noticed something I’m not crazy about Experts.
I can’t go much deeper into this without saying this: I don’t agree all of the expert hype and yes, I know this may sand sound counter cultural.
(Admittedly, it wouldn’t be the first time I confess to being counter cultural. Some might say I thrive on being countercultural).
I would rather be an expert at experiencing life with a beginner’s mindset than be an expert at being an expert.
As I write this, I realize I need to have a beginner’s mind about experts. My mind was saying just now, “An expert is arrogant and all puffed up. Bloated with ego, looks down her nose at the plebeians gathered around her for guidance…. uses language the rest of us don’t know so we have to raise our hands and ask for clarification which just separates us more from her supposed fabulousness.”
I realize there – in these words – is where my issue with experts and expertise is born:
“which just separates us more from her supposed fabulousness.”
I remember one of my friends telling me how afraid she was to approach me because of who I was, that I was known (in the community) that I was talented (according to some people), that I was confident (and perhaps she wasn’t.)
The thing is, I perpetually see myself as totally approachable and totally unintimidating. I never see myself as anything but right there in the sandbox playing with everyone else with my generic orange bucket bought at last year’s summer clearance sales, thrift store shorts and paint covered hands.
Any expertise I have in anything comes with practice and dedication, not because I elevate myself above everyone else – it is because I elevate and invite others to join me – the highly practiced beginner who isn’t particularly skilled at building sandcastles.
I am a beginner at best in building sandcastles and as a writer, I am woefully intimidated by academics. The thing is, I am sure there are many academics who, like me, come to their work every day as beginners.
Here are ten reasons I love beginners. What can you add to this list?
Beginners are gleeful and excited to be engaging in a new activity, even while slightly (or more than slightly fearful).
Beginners are aware they don’t know all there is to know and are actually thrilled just to be in action.
Beginners are earnest. Delightfully earnest.
Beginners are relentlessly curious.
Beginners are open to coaching and suggestions.
Beginners maintain that delicious blend of being goal focused and completely present simultaneously
Beginners are adorably enamored with whatever they’re doing for the first time – they are hungry and thirsty for as many minute details as possible and on the best of days, willing to take every tiny step to get to where their love and passion is steering them.
Beginners are contagiously enthusiastic, which may be problematic (hopefully temporarily) if you have no interest in whatever has struck their fancy. Otherwise, it is so charming it may crack a smile in the most curmudgeonly amongst us.
Beginners are nervous in a good way because they still trust their passion and love will not steer them in a hurtful or anything but good direction. And experts-in-the-making, “it” won’t.
Beginners are careful, but not completely paralyzed by fear as long as they stay in mindful action.
Doesn’t being a beginner sound like a joy?
We forget after a while how pleasant it is to start something new and fresh and fun and here’s the thing: every day we have the option to look at what we are doing from a beginner’s perspective.
Imagine the power of showing up with that beginner’s love, the optimism of a perpetual honeymoon, the happy butterflies in the belly – while simultaneously knowing the ins-and-outs and realities.
Why not at least try it on?
Take five minutes today or tomorrow to consider how you approach life and your projects as a beginner. How might it impact the world if you either increased your beginner mindset or started completely fresh - write (or journal or paint or meditate) your way into it.
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Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world. She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in early Summer and beyond.
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