Upside stress: having a tough time figuring something out that will equip you for better returns long-term.

Downside stress: having a tough time figuring something out that will never be useful again in the grand scheme of things.

How to tell if stress is “worth it” was originally published in butcherpaper on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Getting bored before anyone else gets interested.

It happens right about when I realize the gap between what I thought was going to happen and what actually happens becomes tangible.

Tangible enough for me to understand how much time and effort it is actually going to take to build [insert idea/pursuit] into what was (until very recently) the best idea of all time.

Despite having had this experience over and over again, it still takes conscious effort to preempt the inevitable reality check that will almost always follow explosions of inspiration (if it’s anything worth doing).

Here’s to cultivating a higher tolerance for boredom.

Get Bored More was originally published in butcherpaper on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Today, your message is up against an attention span of a matter of seconds, and an audience that has an acute ability to sniff out, and subsequently call out anything that interrupts their thumb-flicking dopamine binge.

Today, your audience (the younger they are the truer this is) knows they’re being targeted based on things they don’t think you should know about them, their natural reaction — defensive, cynical, and (unlike days gone by) able to respond publicly to whatever it is you put in front of them.

Pour millions of dollars into production, it’s a beautiful ad.
Make people laugh with irrelevant nonsense, it’s a funny ad.
Pull off a first-of-its-kind stunt (and fabricate a case study.) It’s a clever ad.

The common denominator? All ads. All noise that people do their best to avoid. Best case scenario — they’re surprised that thing they just watched had something to do with your brand, (hint: you paid for it) then go about their day.

Some of the most creative minds on the planet have penned legendary copy and directed iconic scenes in service of searing brand names into the minds of the masses. I’ve got a YouTube playlist that proves it. Today, you don’t see it so much. The money spent retaining those brilliant minds is better spent on split testing 34 variations of a button.

There is an alternative. We can embrace “social platforms” to do what those words meant before they described a particular set of filters to amplify self-indulgence. We can use our sizable marketing budgets and influential voices to create tangible societal impact, to broadcast that leadership, and encourage others to follow. The fastest way to create social relevance is to interact positively with society. As a result, you attract and retain customers with an expectation of altruistic investment in exchange for their dollars and employees that long for fulfillment in return for their time.

If we could redirect a fraction of the billions of hours and dollars we collectively spend in conference rooms figuring out how to shoehorn our way to “social relevance” without breaking out of the confines of a screen, we’ll be future-proofing our organizations, and our societies.

People need product as much as product needs people, that’s not going to change. But the expectations of your cash-wielding, increasingly impulsive customer base ARE changing.

The real change that can be effected with the marketing dollars and human hours that are currently spent shouting into deaf ears is phenomenal. The purchasing power of the generations that are demanding that change will determine your future (and wether or not you have one).

Give us a shout if any of the above resonates. If not, best of luck out there.

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