Today I want to talk about POD – Point of difference. Your point of difference is how you stand out in the sea of noise, why you love yourself more than anything. With a world telling us we need to think, look and act the same, POD is all about appreciating how uniquely wonderful you are.
It’s like a laugh in the sea of sadness or a cry at the top of a mountain of prosperity, it’s POD!
Whenever I prepare for a speech I jump for joy at the prospect of feeling the fear and doing it anyway.
You see, on one hand, it absolutely petrifies me that I have to share my innermost thoughts with the world. What if they judge me? What if they think I am weird? My what if’s are the pain relief my brain likes to feel to stop me from taking action and backing out.
My inner child is filled with inquisitiveness and always challenges me with the other hand. I get giddy just thinking about the research I get to do on myself and on others, it excites that I am on the cusp of at of finding out something new and I am about to pass it on to others, I like to call it leaving a legacy. Because when you share what you know, you leave a legacy behind. Luckily for me, my inner child wins over my what if’s, my dream is bigger than my fear. I hope that today’s post gives you some fuel to stay consistently confident.
The three point of differences I want to touch upon is:
- Experience
- Value & Beliefs
- Attitude/Outlook
Whether you are positioning yourself as the ideal problem solver for your client or are answering the question “why are you ideal for this job?” this is where your experience comes in….
Experience
We all have different filters, perceptions, insights which make us unique because of our experience.
You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ Eleanor Roosevelt
Experiences can cut you up or lift you up. It was 2009 when I found myself homeless, homeless with two young kids and not much in my pocket, it’s a story that has many levels, perhaps a story I will leave for another day. However, my main point is that in that experience I grew as a person, as a better person. 
I knew that the gift in that experience was not in self-pity but in gratefulness. I made a decision at that point of time to volunteer to serve people that were in worse scenarios than mine. It’s been my fifth year volunteering with Crisis at Christmas and it is one of the best things I have exchanged my time for. Being homeless and connecting with people to give them hope just felt like it was the right thing to do.
It was Einstein that said “the only source of knowledge is experience”. In his 2005 inagrual speech at Stanford University, Steve Jobs said “you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect the dot’s looking back”. From all the conversations I have had over the last five years with guests at the homeless shelter I have learnt to smile instead of cry, be compassionate instead of selfish and to edify others instead of bringing them down. I truly believe that the path to the best version of me is due to that experience of being homeless, it allowed me to connect with source.
Our experiences don’t predict our future it is just an experience, a lesson we can use to quantum leap. And don’t be fooled into thinking you need other people to approve you, to tell you who you are. Don’t be trapped by Dogma – living the results of other people’s thinking about you, have your own values and beliefs. Values and belief are important which my next point will explain….
Values & Beliefs
I take responsibility for where I am with my life, point blank. My experiences will no doubt change me but I do not let my experiences reduce me. My experiences help to shape my values and beliefs. The one consistent value and belief I have always had is to be kind. Be kind to yourself, be kind to others, just be kind. The values you have are so important and not having a value system is like being in a boxing ring for the heavyweight title with no gloves and then wonder why you didn’t win the title. Or placing a house of cards on a crooked table and then wondering why they keep falling down.
Attitude/Outlook
Your attitude affects your altitude.
It’s having an attitude of gratitude when you are feeling doubtful and sad about your circumstances.
It is about filling the gap for someone else and seeing how you can serve them.
It’s about journaling and releasing anger onto pen and paper and burning it (disclaimer do not burn paper without supervision, it is dangerous)
It’s about not taking feedback personally and seeing how to uplevel with a compassionate humble heart.
When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change – Wayne Dyer
The most effective way I have positivity changed my attitude is by reframing everything. I like to call it the reframe game which you can read more about on my previous post. Basically, it is stepping back putting and framing the situation so you put the situation in perspective to better serve you.
My last thoughts on your point of difference (well sort of)
We all share the same destination – death! The single best invention of life, it clears out the old and brings in the new. But you are alive now and your experience, values/beliefs and overall attitude on life are a few ways to discover how to live that authentic life of abundance. So I encourage YOU to implement your POD today!
If you need help implementing your POD why not book a FREE laser focused session with me?
➡️➡️➡️➡️ >>> Let’s Knock These Issues Out!!! <<<
Love & Light
Ruth-Ellen – Stay Confident ✊
P.S. Here is a quick FB live about POD and other ways to find your POD ?
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