Who says you Should?

“Choosing perfection doesn’t lead to perfection. It leads to paralysis. When you let go of trying to be perfect what you get is you.” – David Sedaris

Last year, my husband got us a subscription to MasterClass. Each night at dinner we would watch one of the classes on cooking, writing, composing, whatever took our fancy. The series by David Sedaris was probably our favorite. (The one on how to cook eggs was a close second) This line struck me hard. I was trying to get my coaching business up and running but I felt everything needed to be perfect before I could get going. I should have a website. I should have a calendar program. I should have a payment plan. I should. I should. I should.

As I started to write my first blog, I of course went to the Interwebs to find out how best to write one. Again with the shoulds. It should be 1,700 – 2,000 words for SEO. It should be engaging. It should have bullet points and be written for a fourth grader. It should. It should. It should.

But, who says I should? This was a question by one of my faculty coaches at CoachU. And she was right. Who says it has to be perfect? Who gets to say that it or I should? So instead of conforming to the shoulds (I was never very good at fully conforming) I have come up with my own shoulds for this blog:

· My blog shall be true to me. That means my voice may be more informal or colloquial than what you may be used to. There may be a 4-letter word occasionally. I can be salty at times. It also means that I am slightly dyslexic. So sometimes, no matter how hard I proofread, words may be jumbled or there may be a typo. Oh well Microsoft Word spell check, you are just going to have to deal.

· My blog shall give credit for inspiration. There are other blogs out there that harvest social media posts for their content without giving credit. I shall give credit while ensuring the confidentiality of the source, especially if it comes from one of my clients.

· My blog shall last for as long as what I have to say is relevant. I’m not going to force myself to write to the point of rambling. I have always been rather concise in my communications so why stop now because the overlords at Google say I should.

· Lastly, this blog will be about the telling of stories and ideas to coach through the challenges we are all experiencing. I don’t claim to have all of the answers but I do know what it is like to be a female executive and I know the mistakes and successes I have made. I shall use this knowledge and experience to help pave the way for others coming up along with me on this journey.

I am not perfect. Neither are you. We are just us. And the only person who gets to say it should is you.

- Kathleen

February 24, 2022