Don't settle for the ordinary

If you are not willing to risk the usual you will have to settle for the ordinary. ~Jim Rohn

As I was reading this quote and mulling it over in my mind, I had to stop and think for a moment—I would say that most people have a different idea or interpretation of what ordinary is.

Take for example the header image. When I look at it, it seems kind of ordinary and plain. But then someone else might look at it and see a thing of beauty. They might argue that the train tracks give the photo depth and the mountains in the distance mixed with the clouds give it perspective. The drab colors might be highlighted by the shadows and the blue of the sky...

Well, you get the idea. It's kind of like that saying, "One person's trash is another's treasure." I am pretty sure that is why garage sales are so popular!

For me, this quote doesn't mean that we have to settle for the ordinary because what is ordinary? To some a sunrise is ordinary, to others it is a daily thing of beauty!

I don't think the meaning of ordinary in the "ordinary" sense applies. The between the lines thinking of the late Jim Rohn really means that if we do the same old thing day in and day out we are going to settle for that—the ordinary. But if we do other things, think differently, question more, perhaps even do more, the ordinary will become extraordinary instead.

If we can make our potential customers think differently about something that, at first glance, seems totally ordinary, we can take that "usual" thing and make someone think differently about it.

Take AI for example. To me, it kind of feels like cheating. I have a co-worker who runs her stories through AI. She may not notice, but I do. Her AI "enhanced" stories read differently. They don't have her "voice" anymore. They read just like a machine wrote them.

I am slowly changing my mind about AI and do use it frequently for ideas, writing articles, doing research, but always polishing the article afterward so that it sounds like I wrote it 100%.

The AI tools I use haven't mastered my voice yet. Perhaps I will have to upgrade my ChatGPT to the paid version. But so far my little Buddy is doing fine. I just have to polish it a lot more. I also like to polish the articles that the WA blogger writes, because it doesn't sound like me!

But changing my mind about AI from the unusual to the ordinary is becoming more real to me. Maybe having something become ordinary to us isn't such a bad thing.

But when it comes to our work, our posts, our communications with others, let's not let those become "ordinary" or we will get passed by.

By allowing ourselves to experiment with things, we can even turn the ordinary into something new. I guess that is the part about "risking the usual."

I am tired. It was a long day at work. Monday's almost always are.

I hope you all have a great week ahead!

Karin