You need to be different if you want to be above the average. One characteristic particular to a vast majority of people in our society is the tendency to conform.
Many people are trapped in mediocrity because they believe that it is difficult and uncomfortable to be different, so why not just conform.
Most people have a powerful desire to fit in and a strong need to remain in good standing with the group—and they believe that they can maintain their good standing by conforming. This tendency to conform is responsible for keeping people trapped under the fiercely influential force of contextual reality.
Conformity keeps people weak and malleable, it allows them to give their power away to others.
If you study the lives of the world's most innovative people, you will find that innovation started with their willingness to be different and to never conform. Innovation cannot occur in the space of conformity.
‘Being Different’ is about being willing to go beyond everything you’ve ever thought was real. And a key step in being different is to make a choice to never conform. Begin with a choice, a simple choice that you must make.
The time is now.
Make a choice now. ‘Being Different’ begins with the choice, not the thought or the theory but the act. You have the power and the total choice to be that at will. This is a choice you have to be willing to make. No matter what it takes, you are going down this path no matter what it looks like. You’ll find that ‘being different’ requires constant vigilance. Keep choosing to let go of the need to conform, follow your knowing and listen to your instincts. This takes some discipline, but the rewards are plenty.
Do whatever it takes to make the choice to never conform to this contextual reality and then all you’ll have to do is keep the momentum going. Celebrate yourself and revel in the fulfilment and amazing rewards that come with that new position. It takes you out of probabilities into possibilities.
Often it becomes highly uncomfortable. Don’t stop because you feel uncomfortable. Just know you have further to go. When you start feeling uncomfortable you are almost to the point of becoming something greater than you’ve ever been. When you get totally uncomfortable, you’re on the brink – the generative edge of reality.
When you go beyond the uncomfortable place, suddenly you’re totally comfortable and everything is bigger and better than it ever was before. Also it is important to realise that being different means you might bump heads with other people. That is okay! Stop caring what people think. Don’t be so afraid to colour outside of the lines that you never pick up your crayon!
More importantly, you must not allow yourself to operate within the limitations of this reality or be bound by what is.