The Genius is in the Simplicity

bydaddyrabbit

486 followers

10 years ago

(This is Part 2 of an ongoing back-to-the-beginning series of blog posts as I delve deeper into the depths of WA's teachings)

My dad is not the type that would sit you on his knee and expound on the finer aspects of life. Hell, we never really had the birds-and-bees talk and I've been happily married for 13 years now with a amazing son and beautiful set of twins.

However, there are three things that I was told at a very young age by my father that has kept me out of untold amounts of trouble:

One, if you need a credit card to sustain your lifestyle, then you need to take a notch down in lifestyle.

Two, anyone who tells you that they've never told a lie, just told their second one.

Three, if the manual is written correctly, you can't go wrong reading it. Hang on to that one for a second.

As I've told you, I work in I.T. for a media company. A broadcast media company to be exact. Transmitters, IRD's, satellites, digital feeds, video conversions, embedding, etc.can definitely get overwhelming at times. There was one time where we had to call in some help on a transmitter. The guy was from Texas and was a self-proclaimed full-blooded cowboy. He had the hat, the boots, the jeans, the belt buckle the size of an adult foot, the huge dually pickup truck, every device was a gizmo or critter, every person was a "gal" or a "fella", and he had a seemingly ravenous appetite for steak. I know it sounds totally stereotypical, but he wore the pride of those facts like an intoxicating cologne. I'm from Mississippi, so we have our own little brand of dialect, but listening to this guy talk was like watching an amazing foreign film.

Winding down, we were attempting to satisfy that need for steak at a local franchise. Of all the hilarity in his conversations, one thing stood out, then it got real:

"The genius is in the simplicity"

Of course, I had to ask him to elaborate. This guy was literally a demi-god when it came to transmitters. Throughout his process, he never dove into a manual, referred to a blueprint, or asked that many localized questions of our equipment. He just came in, joked, and fixed. He explained:

"A genius is no doubt very good at his or her craft. But, a real genius? That fella can explain his craft to the uninitiated without confusion or perplexity." In a flash, we went from cowboys and steaks to Einstein and relativity.

Then he asked me to try it out. He said, "You work on computers for a living. Tell me how to navigate to the contact page of your company's website without saying the words 'browser' or 'click'." It's a lot harder than you think.

Internet Marketing is not for everyone. Many people have the stigma of get-rich-quick engraved in their minds causing impatience and some people, like me, are simply skeptical because of past failures even though they followed the instructions word-for-word, invested hours of work and didn't make dollar one. I would hate to fathom that I am a bad student and there are certainly not bad teachers out there.

Can WA marry together "genius" and "simple" to come up with the perfect Internet Marketing manual? The reviews say "yes". I say: You're Sheldon and I'm Penny. Go.