Oh boy. When I was a kid, I definitely marched to the beat of my own drum.
In fact, whenever we went somewhere, whether it was to the store or an event like the fair, an amusement park, a rodeo or anything like that, my parents always knew where to find me; in the lost and found. I knew the drill. It was as if I knew the place, in every place that we went. It had the wax paper and the crayons and they’d bring you a drink, you’d hang out and wait for your parents to come and find you.
Marching to the beat of my own drum has accounted for a lot of growth and a lot of pain in my life.
I could never really follow the lines and stick with the group. We’d be looking at something, whatever it is, and the whole family is moving along and pretty soon, “Oh!” I get distracted. I was probably the original poster child for ADD and ADHD, but there was no Ritalin, there were no medications for it. It was more a hard discipline back in those days and it took a lot to get through to me.
But the point is, is that marching to the beat of our own drum can absolutely be one of the most amazing things in our lives, too. Because if you think about it, no artist ever gets famous doing paint by numbers. We have to go through this process of learning who we are and how to march and how our body, our mind works, how to fit in with our society, with our peers. Then, in order to truly become ourselves, we need to use that framework and break away and then start playing our own tune. That’s where every famous artist, whether it be music or painting, drawing, any of that, learns that you can’t do it based on someone else’s template. It’s always the innovation that truly skyrockets and makes people well-known.
So as we follow our life’s path and we’re going down the stream of life, don’t ever be afraid to all of a sudden jump out of the bank, make some special moves, do something special and leave your mark. It’s okay to go with the flow of life and be with everybody else because we all want to be accepted.
We all want to be loved and want to find ourselves with everyone else. But sometimes, what truly makes us special is getting lost.