10 Resolutions for the Remarkable

(Photo: Luo Shaoyang)

I wouldn’t ask you to do anything I won’t commit to myself. Here are my resolutions for 2008.

(Incidentally, here as always, “customers” just means “people you want to persuade to take action.” When you read these, think of the folks you want to convince to pay for your service, donate to your nonprofit, volunteer for your project, attend your church, whatever.

1. Quit spending so much energy trying to bullshit yourself and everyone else. Be what you are–glorious, dorky, embarrassed, proud, miraculous. The world’s wisest people agree on one thing: you are fundamentally good. Quit hiding and start celebrating.
2. Put your customers ahead of yourself. Ask yourself every day what they need from you, how they benefit from you, what you can do for them that no one else can. Take a minute right now to calendar a regular appointment: on the 7th of every month, come up with a new way to create surprising value for your customers. Don’t just think about it, do it.
3. Don’t be boring.
4. Speak clearly. Write clearly. Think clearly.
5. Ask for what you need.
6. Decide what promise your brand makes. Then bring everything you do into alignment with that. How you answer the phone. (In fact, whether you answer the phone.) Your email address. Your Web site. Your haircut. Your reading habits. Your television habits. Live the promise that you make. Get rid of all the false distinctions between who you are and what you do.
7. Commit to joy.
8. You have a tremendous amount to be grateful for. Think about and express gratitude daily.
9. Help someone much worse off than you are. I’m terribly grateful that in 2007, I was able to make donations that repaired cleft palates for 5 children. I also started sponsoring a five-year-old boy in Lesotho through World Vision. Next year, I commit to do the same again at least. You truly don’t have to give a lot. A little bit of latte money can turn a desperate, helpless life into a productive one–and it will bring you more pleasure than anything else you’re spending your dough on now, honest.
10. Live by my friend Krissie’s motto: Fuck Doubt. Press On. Copy it out in your favorite pen and put it somewhere you can see it every day.

Made any resolutions this year? Have some ideas about how to become more remarkable, or how to communicate with other people in a more remarkable way? Leave a comment and let us know!