When you decide to stop hiding in the shadow. To shatter the comfort of the status quo, you will be noticed. You’ll be noticed at some point… If you don’t get notice now but continue to respect and love your cause enough to keep at it, there will come a time you will be noticed.
Some work gains momentum as more people become aware and decide they want to contribute to your cause… Until you get there, you will feel naked. Every heretic, bringing something new or challenging the status quo will feel naked. This feeling generally doesn’t go away until their product or change they bring is somewhat widely accepted.
The reason heretic leaders often feel ‘naked’ is because of the intimate nature of their cause. It is a very intimate thing to say to the world, “Look at me and the change I want to make in the world…”
change will always mean vulnerability for those who lead it
It is vulnerable to stand out. Once you put something out you indirectly ask people to not only take a look at your work but also look at you… For some reason it is not enough to look at what you have to offer, but humanity somehow feels obligated to want to know why you, of all people, are the one to shatter the comfortable and acceptable status quo.
People often challenge why you must be the one who stand out and not them (or someone else). And because they’re not the ones who’ve shipped they’re want to take you down… This is where critics are born.
Some critics are just voices of jealousy. They’re just expressing their anger on you for not doing what you’ve done, which is actually what they wish they had done.
Unfortunately, leading your team or organization through change will expose some things about your organization and team. It will expose individuals’ areas of lack as they contribute to the organization. And no one likes being vulnerable.
Bringing about change not only means disregarding the status quo but your feeling of being vulnerable as well
Feeling vulnerable is inseparable from leading and causing change. As a heretic, you will always be challenged on why you should be the one to bring change. The truth is your qualification, as determined by the heretics’ critics committee, will never be good enough.
Everyone is heretic is never good enough until their efforts actually start changing the world. Even then you still might never be good enough in the sight of some…
Every innovator feels… well, naked.
Be bold. Be /ˈherətik/.