Category: Personal Reflections

I just received an email with the following request: “if you service the following states, NY, NJ, PA, OH, MD, VT, MI, ME, CT and NH…”. I immediately closed and deleted the email, for I’m in Washington. But then I started thinking, “why did the sender blast this out to the entire country?” Today, right now, with pretty much every CRM tool, you can refine your targets. With a few minutes of work, the sender of this email could’ve culled a few words from their message as well as targeted her message. Too many irrelevant emails and you find yourself in the spam box.

This ability to customize your message makes it significantly more relevant to your customers, to your audience. It makes you look more professional, and more knowledgeable. Powerful traits if you’re trying to build an audience, or come across as an influencer. Or, if you simply don’t want to waste your customer’s time. Which is good thing to desire.

So, the data is (or should be) there. Use it! Make yourself look smart, talented, professional and engaged. Unless you’re hoping to create more spam fodder.

A friend of mine pointed me to this article recently, which is found powerful as an explanation of living with chronic conditions: The Spoon Theory. It’s a great allegory for the life-management that those living with chronic conditions (lupus, chronic fatigue, etc) constantly deal with. Each of life’s decisions represent a significant opportunity cost.

This article comes from But You Don’t Look Sick, a website dedicated to those with hidden disease. Our culture stigmatizes those who don’t meet our expectations for being “ill”. My theory: it’s tied to a disdain for folks “trying to get something for nothing”, and our lingering distrust of others. It’s easy to believe that they’re “making it up”, whether they “thrive on drama” or are “playing for sympathy”, or whatever other pejorative label we rattle off. It’s an easy, and painful reaction. One that needs consideration and control.

Personally, I’d rather be played a fool (as the adage goes) than not be supportive to a friend in need. Yet I, too, struggle with these reactions. And so I proceed, more aware, towards some semblance of wisdom.