THE POWER OF DIFFERENCE BY L.A. NIK
"Your only value in life is how you differ from everyone else." - L.A. Nik
You have the confidence. Now you need to stand out from the crowd.
You need to show the world how different you are and how you’re unique. If you just blend in with the world around you, no one will notice you and you won’t get support for your dream. If you are just like everyone else, why would anyone notice you? They won’t.
If you look at a carton of eggs, does any one egg stand out from the rest? No! Now take one out, replace it with a brown one, and look at the carton of eggs again. What do you see? Eleven white eggs? No! You see the single brown egg in a sea of white. It’s true. Try it. Make yourself unique. Be the brown egg in a carton of white ones.
My girlfriend and I went to a live taping of the "Prairie Home Companion" radio show. Half way through the show, the host Garrison Keillor, always reads a select few messages on air that have been written by audience members. The messages are dropped into a basket during the show then given to Mr. Keillor. On the day we went, there were a least five hundred messages in the basket by the time it got to us. Without some sort of difference, the chance of our message being chosen and read, was very slim. Virtually impossible.
I had to figure out a way for our message to stand out from all of the others. I had to make my message the brown egg in the sea of white ones.
So just as the basket whet up to the host, I took our piece of paper, our message, folded it into a paper airplane, and stuck it in the corner of the basket. Do you know what happened? It was the first one they picked. Our message was picked out of hundreds of others and read live to all of the show’s listeners around the country! I call this The Power of Difference.
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| Looking different only gets you noticed. It's up to you after that. |
What does that special message in the basket teach you? It teaches you that being unique makes a difference. Difference gets noticed. I hang out at bars during happy hour surrounded by men in business suits and ties. They all look the same. They all shop at the same store and get the same hair cut. You might think I look ridiculous sitting around all these business people with my black clothes, black hair, and black hat. I don’t care. I look different and I stand out therefore, I look like the more interesting person to talk to in the room.
Think about it. If you had a choice of talking to a guy in a suit, talking to another faceless drone on his smartphone, while typing an email on his laptop or someone else, someone who is uniquely different, who will you choose? You will choose the guy who stands out. Why? Because, if you’re smart, you’ll see that person and think, “I bet I can learn something from that guy.”
Fifteen minutes of fame is easy to come by - your difference gets your foot in the door. Your confidence seals the deal and turns the fifteen minutes into a lifetime. Without the confidence, your fifteen minutes becomes two. Everything, including the Power of Difference, connects to the Power of Confidence.
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| Not fitting in isn't always bad. This was a contest to get people to come to downtown Minneapolis, find me, and take a picture. I was so different in Minneapolis that I was easy to recognize. |
I wasn’t L.A. Nik in L.A. I didn’t become L.A. Nik until I moved to Minneapolis. People would walk up to me and say, “Who are you?”
“I’m Nik,” I’d tell them.
“Where do you live?”
“L.A.”
So everyone started calling me L.A. Nik. I’m not even from L.A. I’m from Philly! I lived in L.A.
Now, though, Minneapolis is my home.
Throughout my life, I’ve lived in many cities up and down both coasts. This is the only place I’ve lived where there were no other rockers. In Minneapolis, I’m the only one here! I’m unique. I’m different. I’m the brown egg in the sea of white ones. I’m the guy with the black fedora in a sea of business suits, briefcases, and smartphones.
Within weeks of living here in Minneapolis, I’d received a double-page spread in a local magazine. I’d been interviewed on radio and television. I couldn’t stop the promotion I was receiving. Why? Because I was different than anyone else in the city. They had never encountered someone as different as me.
People are very cautious here in the Midwest. But they accepted me. I’m confident in my difference. That was key. You can be different all you want, but if you don’t have an ounce of confidence, you become a joke. In Los Angeles, I see people lock their car doors at street corners when they see me. Not here. Here in Minneapolis, people shake my hand and say “Hi.” I’m different. They want to learn from me.
If you take a letter to the photocopier, make a copy, make a copy of the copy, make a copy of the copy of the copy, it eventually becomes unreadable. Eventually, the copy becomes just a mass of black ink. That’s what happens to you when you try to be just like everyone else – you become indistinguishable from everyone else. You stop growing. You stop progressing in life.
What would happen if a company started to hire the same people with the same skill set? They would eventually become stagnant. Their products will become uninteresting and dull. They will not be able to compete with other companies who are hiring talent with the latest and greatest knowledge. In months, they’d probably declare bankruptcy and close their doors. Does this sound familiar?
Think about corporate life where things have become dull and stagnant. They’ve become “corporatized.” Everyone is in the same suit and tie. Black shoes. White shirt. Same haircut. Same tie. People have become drones. No one sticks out. Everyone is afraid to be unique – to be different. The same happens to their products.
What about the companies who are energized by change – by difference. Who embrace it. People stand in lines to buy their products – and pay lots of money for them.
When you have to apply for a job and turn in a resume, how are you going to make your resume stand out among five hundred other candidates? If you apply to a company that doesn’t like difference, they’ll probably frown on a “different” resume. It doesn’t fit their corporate standard. It will end up in the trash can. Why would you want to work there?
Personally, if I was actually applying for a job, I'd do my resume on black paper with white ink. It would stand out in a stack of white paper and get noticed! Companies who relish difference would embrace my resume and pick it from the basket in the sea of white ones.
If you have confidence in who you are, you will always be different and you will stand out. Your difference becomes part of you – it becomes a natural extension of you. If you don't have confidence and you just try to blend in, you will just follow the herd and you'll be a photocopied version of yourself – you’ll become indistinguishable from everyone else.
Don't photocopy your life. Embrace your difference and show it in its true form.
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The easiest way to stand out is in the way you look. When I was in high school back in Delaware, I was the only one who looked like I did. I was doing the rocker look long before it became popular. Remember, there was no Internet and the top metal bands weren't known yet. But I knew who I was inside and I wanted to show who I was on the outside.
When you are confident in who you are on the inside you should show it in the way you look! Just because you might have a job that requires you to wear a uniform or a suit doesn't mean you have to wear a “home suit” of khakis or sweatpants when you're not at work. You’re free to be yourself. Experiment with the way you look. Find what works and makes you stand out in the crowd.
Confidence will always stand out. But you also want to look like someone interesting to talk to. When I went to L.A., I looked like a lot of rockers in the area. But the one thing that made me stand out was I shaved my head on one side. No one else did that then! Other guys ended up copying me!
If you dress like everyone else, use the same words, communicate the same as everyone else, watch the same TV shows, have the same hobbies, and listen to the same music as everyone else, where's your value? How are you different? You’re not.The fact is, everyone is different! You have to find yours.
You have to play around with the way you look and you have to try different things to find out what makes you, you. Instead of finding a group and trying to fit in, you should find out who you are first and then find the people you fit with. People do it backwards all the time.
How you look is like advertisement. When you go out in public, how you look can attract people you'd want to meet. This is why a lot of artistic or gothic kids look like they do. They want to hang around others like them. I was already dressing like a rocker and I wanted to hang with other rockers. Music can be the great congregator. It's the easiest thing to have in common with someone and can be the starting point for great friendships.
Advertise yourself! Promote yourself! Show who you are on the inside by the way you look on the outside. People will find you interesting and will want to talk to you. Don't be afraid to stand out. If you're already confident in who you are, who you really are, you will want the attention!
If you are not different, it is virtually impossible to progress in life. In order to learn, to create, and to share you have to have a difference in life.
If you hang out with the same group of people day in and day out and they are duplicates of yourself (because you don’t have the confidence to branch out), then there is absolutely no way for you to progress. There will be nothing for you to learn – because everyone knows the same thing. There will be nothing to create – because it will have been done already. There will be nothing for you to share – because no one will be interested in what you have to say!It’s true!
If you always go to the same old bar with the same group of friends, and cheer for the same sports team, change it up! Go to the bar where the opposing team’s fans go and wear the cap from your team (the opposing team). You will be different! You will be noticed. You will learn from them. You will create new opportunities for yourself. You will be able to share what you have learned with others.
Wherever you're going, find out how you can stand out in that crowd. I go to a bar that's filled with suit-wearing investment bankers. I wear a black fedora, eyeliner, black pants, a black leather jacket, and black nail polish. Do you think I’m different in this bar? Fuck yes! I stand out!
And the business men and women want to talk to me because obviously, someone with my confidence is brave enough to stand out in that crowd and not be intimidated.
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You have to be willing to change. I woke up in 9th grade and knew who I was but I continued to grow – to continue to grow and learn. You have to exercise your brain each and every day and constantly change.
Everyone is afraid to change, but change is good! I say this a lot, and I mean it! Changing to stand out in whatever crowd you happen to be in is the Power of Difference. If you do the same thing every day, look the same way every day, go to the same places, the same stores, buy the same food, see the same people and remain in a routine day in and day out, you will slowly lose the stimulation you need to evolve and you will lose your confidence, lose your dream, and you'll never stand out and make a difference.
Basically, you have a choice: you can live off other people’s lives or you can make your own.
Never remain stagnant. Being in a rut and continuing to live in the past won't get you anywhere towards the future. Pay attention to your environment and what’s around you – learn, create, and share. Then find a way to be different and stand out in that environment.
