“Differentiation starts with the choice to do one thing well” says Bernadette at The Story of Telling blog.
I wanted to break that powerful statement down and offer up some food of thought for celebrants today.
The choice
Your celebrant practise, the act and art of you being the celebrant you are is a choice. It may well be that “every” celebrant does it “that way” or that there is an accepted or traditional method of doing something, but you still make the choice. Even if the choice is to change nothing and do the same as everyone else.
To do
The art of being different requires doing. Then failing, flailing, and falling, and finking (I really wanted all the words to start with F), and facing forwards and doing again.
No-one’s been different by not doing.
The truth is that you’ll actually find out how different you are a year or two after you start the doing and you’ll actually be a whole lot weirder and more wonderful than you ever could have imagined.
One Thing
I see celebrants worldwide offer up every single service and ceremony you could think of. If you don’t think you’ve found your difference yet, my challenge to you is to narrow that down to one thing, at least at the start. I’m not saying you can’t do funerals and weddings, but if you’re failing at finding your footing in both, put one on ice for a season and make the choice to do one thing …
Well
You are really bad at a large number of things. I know I’m terrible at earthmoving, kitesurfing, video games, carpentry, the list goes on, but I would count my successes to figuring out what I can do well.
My question for you, and for the comments, is what do you think you do well. Shout your own praises from the comments section.
And secondly, if you know another member of this community does something well but they need to hear it, mention it in the comments. Or at least send them a text.
Help others make the choice to do one thing well.
This is so true, and it’s super hard to figure out at the start of any career. Every marketing guru yells “find your niche!” But how on earth do you know what your niche is when you’re just starting out and you have no idea what kind of people will even like what you offer, and what kind of thing you’ll end up being great at offering!
I’m also a firm believer in the “get really good at one thing before you go on to another thing”, and you’re absolutely right to use weddings and funerals as a great example there. Hone your craft in one or the other first, and the other one will come much more naturally.
Thank guys. Looking forward to finding my groove!
I just want to do a shout out and big thank you to Sarah Aid! She was kind enough to offer some advice and wording for pre ceremony to warm up my crowd a little and this Saturday just gone I had the best responsive and interactive crowd yet! Being from a smaller rural community it can he hard to find people to talk to and bounce ideas off but thanks to this group and a few others on facebook I feel I’m getting more skills and knowledge than I ever thought possible and am getting my grove! Thanks Again!!!