It wasn’t even a dream 13 years ago when as part of my job I started speaking at Rotary clubs, Schools, RSA’s, Age Concerns the odd corporate here and there, as experiences increased the job created a dream and I thought I’d position myself in front of the bureaus – agencies that represent professional speakers.
The best response I got was “you’re on our newsletter database”. It’s nice to get a response but essentially this meant I was on the wrong side of the business. In hindsight my ambition was ahead of my readiness, but my drive at the time was to turn rejection in affection, so I kept speaking, my audiences got bigger, things got more professional and when the bureau News Letter arrived in my mailbox I wasn’t intimidated by the speakers that were been promoted but I was inspired by them and I wanted to play with them.
How do we handle rejection?
How do we find our competitive advantage to turn rejection into affection?
“I want to speak in New York City”, that’s what I said to others and that’s what happened, cool aye. That’s the short story but through a celebration of the human spirit and an attitude fuelled by belief we can achieve.
Last month one of the major bureaus that has now represented me for five years put me on the same platform as rock star U.S speaker Ross Bernstein, I say rock star as he’s spoken on platforms that I dream to speak on. In a nutshell he’s a peak performance speaker who takes lessons he’s leant from interviewing the worlds greatest athletes and shares them with business so they can become their own champions – he is a legend to check out.
In an interview with Wayne Gretzky who’s the NHL’s (National Hockey League) all time leader in goals and all time leader in assists but with twice as many assists as goals Ross asked him about that, Wayne said “a goal makes one guy happy, but an assist makes two guys happy.”
The more I hear the stories that give me Goosebumps, the more I meet people behind big dreams, the more I come to realize that our true success isn’t determined by what we achieve individually but how we learn from our own experiences to create momentum and success for others.
New York said “yes Cam”, the bureaus said “yes Cam” thanks to those (many of whom are readers of this awesome magazine) who had seen ways that they could assist, the assistance making many people very happy.
As we head into our New Year, what goals do we believe in for ourselves and who can we assist to make 2017 the most awesome season yet?
Cheers to the festive season!
