Are you pretending not to be awesome? The answer is in your About page.

This cannot be overstated: you’ve got an amazing past.

It’s filled with thoughts and feelings and moments of magnificence that make you unique. You’ve seen the world from an angle nobody else shares and it gives you a perspective nobody else can offer.

So why do you approach your About page as though you have nothing to say?

As kids, we’re taught conformity. We’re taught that uniqueness is to be shunned. Shunning uniqueness is woven into the social fabric. It’s a human survival thing to band together in predictable blocks. So we grow up afraid of who we are, avoiding it, pretending it isn’t there.

This can make for a bumpy ride in adulthood, and it can make it hard to look favorably and with confidence on that special thing you have to offer the world.

 

Some source material

Jenny Bones has made three important contributions to this topic.

First, she wrote a great post about the elements of the About page. It’s thorough, easy to follow and good enough to be built into WordPress somewhere.

Second, she wrote a wonderfully open and daring post connecting her experience of childhood sexual abuse to her skill as a coach. This is an important demonstration of the fact that everything you have is something you have to offer.

(I’m not saying you need to open your soul or reveal painful information. I’m saying it’s part of you and can inform what you do bring into the open in a way that might help somebody.)

Jenny’s third contribution is that she uses the word cunnilingus in the title of the About page post. It’s so rare to see that word in writing anymore.

But even with such clear instruction as the cunnilingus post, the About page can still seem like an exercise in futility.

 

Something wicked this way comes

Wicked as in cool. As in very cool. As in new social fabric woven from individual and collaborative creativity cool. That’s what’s going on around us in this wave of online entrepreneurship. We creatives are starting to have our day.

But it brings a serious challenge.

Online you have to step out into the open and that’s why I love the emerging internet paradigm. It calls upon creatives to stand up and make a go of it. It shoots down all the excuses with free, powerful tools for content creation and distribution, and stellar networking capabilities that make almost anything possible.

Then it leads us straight into our hesitation, our resistance, and all the obstacles that plague our creative process. But as creatives, as entrepreneurs, as high priests and priestesses of the new creation, we have a high and singular calling to be awesome.

And awesome doesn’t hold back.

So why is the About page such a struggle? Because you’re pretending not to be awesome.

And you’ll have to stop that right now.

But how?

 

Admit that you are Awesome

No matter what life has told you to the contrary, you are in fact awesome, unique and white hot. And here’s something you might not like to own up to: somewhere down inside you know it’s true. Or you suspect it might be and to me that’s the same thing.

You wouldn’t be reading a post about the About page if you didn’t think you had something to offer. So, quietly admit it to yourself and start letting it be true.

 

Be the benefit

You’ve got something to share that is unique to you. Oh, you do. Even if you don’t have a product offering you’ve got you, your outlook, your own brand of awesome.

All awesomeness really is, is reckless abandonment to your own beauty. Even when you can’t feel it or don’t believe it’s there. That’s the reckless part.

So, you want your About page to help people feel good about connecting with you and sharing your work. You want them to recognize your contribution and amplify it.

Start with excitement.

Why are you excited to be blogging? Why are you excited to be participating online? Why are you excited about what you’re here to share? Stand in your excitement and express yourself from there.

This will make the simple experience of reading your work and passing it along a benefit to your visitors.

 

Um, excuse me, you just spilled awesome on my slacks

Oh, really? That must mean you’ve been reading my About page. Because that’s what happens on my About page. You get awesome on your slacks.

Actually, my About page needs work. So, I’d love some feedback. It would be great if you could take a few minutes to read it, then let me know your thoughts in the comments to this post.

Am I pretending not to be awesome?

Be nice, but let me have it.

I’m here to learn.

 

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