Right now, I’m reading an incredible book by Cheryl Strayed titled, “Tiny Beautiful Things.” For a period of time, best selling author, Cheryl Strayed wrote an advice column known as “Dear Sugar.” The book includes many of the questions she received along with her answers. Her answers to the various questions are life changing and you should definitely read this book.
The book isn’t about selling homes, marketing, or making money. However, many of the lessons “Dear Sugar” provides can be applied in our own lives. One of the questions “Dear Sugar” answered was from a female writer in her 20s who was struggling to write. I’ve read Cheryl’s response to this writer numerous times and I’ve only had the book for a few hours. Here is a portion of Dear Sugars answer:
“How many women wrote beautiful novels and stories and poems and essays and plays and scripts and songs in spite of all the crap they endured. How many of them didn’t collapse in a heap of “I could have been better than this” and instead went right ahead and became better than anyone would have predicted or allowed them to be. The unifying theme is resilience and faith. The unifying them is being a warrior and a motherfucker. It’s not fragility. It’s strength. It’s nerve. And “if your Nerve, deny you-” as Emily Dickerson wrote, “go above your Nerve.” Writing is hard for every last one of us- straight white men included. Coal mining is harder. Do you think miners stand around all day talking about how hard it is to mine for coal? They do not. They simply dig. You need to do the same….”
“So write. Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Write like a motherfucker.”
How do you read something like this and not have it impact you? We may not be aspiring writers, but we all have the same problems in our chosen profession. We can certainly apply Sugar’s advice to our businesses with a simple re-write:
“How many real estate professionals sold homes, condos, apartments, vacant lots, multi-family properties, commercial projects in spite of all the crap they endured. How many of them didn’t collapse in a heap of “I could have been better than this” and instead went right ahead and became better than anyone would have predicted or allowed them to be. The unifying them is resilience and faith. The unifying them is being a warrior and a motherfucker. It’s not fragility. It’s strength. It’s nerve. And “if your Nerve, deny you-” as Emily Dickerson wrote, “go above your Nerve.” Selling is hard for every last one of us. Coal mining is harder. Do you think miners stand around all day talking about how hard it is to mine for coal? They do not. They simply dig. You need to do the same.”
So sell. Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Sell like a motherfucker.”
