Your Life Is a Jagged Line

 

Helloo0O Ladies and Gentlemen!

Welcome back to Graceland Ontario, your one stop location in linking the success lessons of Elvis Presley back to your own life. Today, we’ll be talking about those ups and downs, the jagged lines, which tend to surface in all our lives and how best to deal with them.

If you look at your productivity in the short term, you’re looking at a jagged line. Some days you do well, others poorly. Sometimes you’re inspired, others you don’t know where to start. But, that doesn’t really matter. We all lose a little loss once in a while. All that matters is the long term.

 

At my blog, Graceland Ontario (yep, that’s right − here), the day to day views are scattered − I’ve seen 49 views a day and as few as zero, even now it’s more established. But, the long term is all that matters, and it shows a very different picture. As long as you produce as much as you can everyday, you can look at a steady increase. Despite all those jagged lines Graceland Ontario in the long term has been growing exponentially. And this type of growth is everywhere, it’s a pattern, and therefore it’s useful to watch out for.

Look at friends − you gain one here, you lose one there. You meet somebody at the bus stop, someone’s killed in a car accident. It’s another jagged line. But as long as you continue to meet people, you’re going to see it steady out in the long term and you’ll eventually have more friends than you’ll lose − you’ll create a steady gain over time.

Now, let’s move back to Elvis Presley, particularly his early chart successes.

 

Elvis started from nothing in the early mid-50’s at Sun. But by 1955, he’d become one of their biggest names. In late 1955, he was sold to RCA for more than anyone else in the business, including Sinatra, was worth. Then, in ’56 he’d flunked in Las Vegas and brought out Heartbreak Hotel, which’s different sound made RCA think they’d bought an expensive flop. More jagged lines. But overall, his RCA LP, Elvis Presley, was a major success. Soon enough he wasn’t only a big music star, he was also topping in the movies. And that’s not mentioning all the times he ended up on television in that 1956, alone! Whether you look at his Hollywood career or his passage into Las Vegas, you can still see those jagged lines. But even when he lost something, he gained something else − his marriage broke up, but he played the first International concert. He had his last top 10 hit, but he broke records in Vegas. All those jagged lines, those ups and downs, built up overall, like my blog, Graceland Ontario, like your friend count. So, when Elvis passed away in 1977, many people looked back at a successful career despite the criticism he received over more jagged lines (his increased weight).

 

As in the stock market, it's very hard to only gain. You tend to lose a little over time. The key is not to worry about it but enjoy those descents. You know everything that goes down will come up again when you’re doing a half decent job (notice I say when you’re doing a half decent job − can’t always speak for the stock market, though). What ever anybody else says, those jagged lines aren’t down to stay. They’ll work their way up again, and you’ll make all the people who said they wouldn’t and freaked out at the first sign of a downturn look like idiots. And then, in years to come, when you’ve put in the best work you can and consistently attempted to make those jagged lines change, you’ll look only at a gradual climb. Those jagged lines add up to a mountain with persistence. And, as David Deangelo says, Persistence is the price of success.

 

Elvis’s Lessons:

Your life is full of jagged lines. It’s not your fault, they’re just there. But, it’s ok − they’re in my blog, too, and most people’s friend counts, and Elvis’s career. They tell you despite what you gain, you’ll probably lose along the way, too. Again, relax. As long as you continue to work, moving forward, those jagged lines will work their way up again, too. Even when others freak out and say they won’t, they will. They do for me, they did for Elvis, they will for you. Persistence will get you over the bumps those jagged lines make. And then, in the future, when you look back, all you’ll see is a steady incline. That’s a successful life, my friend, not a fairy tale.

P.S. If you’d like to see Elvis singing, here’s a Youtube video of him with “ Datin’ ” from the movie, Paradise, Hawaiian Style. I’d never heard this one before…

P.P.S. If you liked this post (or if you *gasp* didn’t), remember to leave a comment below or email me at alexghilson@gmail.com. I’d be glad to reply to whatever you have to say (unless you start spouting Nazi propaganda on me… but then again, you probably won’t).

If you liked this post, you might also like these other FR.EE Graceland Ontario updates:

• The Time Trap
• Strange And Wonderful Things 
• Accept it How It Is
• Traits of the Superhero 
• Doing All You Can

Getting Into It

Hey Ladies and Gentleman,

Thanks for joining me for another week at Graceland Ontario where we talk about the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll and learn the lessons he presented during his life that can help you in yours. Today, we’re making note of ‘getting into it’.

“Getting into what?” you may say… Good question.

‘Getting into it’ is when you put all the passion you can muster behind what you’re doing, when you savoir the very action of your job − when you find the joy in your work.

Really, you can get into anything whether that be a book, a project, or chemistry homework. But whatever it is, there can’t be any half measures − when you ‘get into it’, there’s no turning back.

That’s still a little confusing… To illustrate, let’s turn to my idol, Elvis Presley. Elvis sang a lot of fast songs when he was young. The crowds that flocked to him in the 50’s wanted to hear the fast rockabilly beats he and the Blue Moon Boys were pumping out of Sun Studios and RCA. Elvis would put all his energy into performances. Looking at clips from the Milton Berle Show are evidence of this. He would dance, and twist and jive to the music. He would ‘get in to it’. And people loved the music even more because of that.

But the years went by… Now Elvis is in the International Hotel in Las Vegas. He’s singing a country song called “Just Pretend”. It’s a slow ballad and there isn’t much opportunity for Elvis to swivel his hips. But he ‘gets into it’ all the same. He doesn’t walk around, but he sways to the music, heaving with emphasis at the dramatic parts. And guess what, the Casino audience is silent. Even with the slow song, the energy is still there. Elvis is still ‘getting into it’ and, by doing so, people love the slow song as much as the faster ones.

So, what does this mean for you?

Imagine you do a project for work. You go up and the rest of your company’s looking at you like you have three heads. You feel a little weak at the knees but you know you’re not getting out of this. So, you’ve got a choice: do you slide through it as quickly as possibly without enjoying it, not making the subject dance with your audience, or do you ‘get into it’ and give the presentation your all?

Well, given the Elvis pattern, ‘get into it’. Because as soon as you ‘get into it’ and start enjoying what you’re doing, others will notice it. And even if your presentation is a slow song, like “Just Pretend”, and there isn’t much room for you to swivel your hips, you can still give it your all. And like Elvis, people will see the excitement of what you’re saying and agree with you, probably subconsciously, the presentation will go like a dream and you’ll sell your idea with ease.

Elvis’s Lessons:

When you have a job to do, ‘get into it’; that is, do it with all the passion you can muster. By ‘getting into it’ people will enjoy what you’re doing more because you enjoy it. This may even happen subconsciously to your audience. And when your audience enjoys what you’re saying or doing, they’re more likely to support you, buy from you, over-all be awesome to you… Getting into it’s worth it for so many reasons.

P.S. If you’re interested in seeing Elvis ‘getting into it’ with “Just Pretend” at the International from Elvis: That’s the Way it Is, here’s a Youtube clip of the performance I talked about.

P.P.S. Remember to comment below or send me an email at alexghilson@gmail.com to add your input to this article.

High Expectations

Check out the clip of Elvis’s rehearsal of “The Wonder of You” from Youtube below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSodZqm2rv8&feature=related

Through it’s an awesome song, hearing it three or so times is perhaps pushing it. It might even seem like a waste of time for a busy person like yourself. But Elvis didn’t.

Now, unless you’re an intense Elvis fan (like myself) then you might not listen to the whole clip, but you can still pick up the importance of what Elvis does in it.

This clip is from February 1970, a couple months before Elvis did the famous shows that went on to become part of the documentary film Elvis – That’s the Way it Is. You’ll notice that even at this early stage, Elvis and his band are playing very well together. Actually, despite a bit of messing about, the first rehearsal shot at the song would probably have been show worthy. Yet, Elvis and his band go through it again. Then, on the second rehearsal of the song, Elvis actually stops the band and tells them to change what they had been doing well to try something that he felt would be better in the long run.

On the third time through, the band plays once more, sounding better than it had either of the two previous times and with Elvis’s improvement added by the backup singers towards the end of the verse. Compare this to the version of “The Wonder of You” included in Elvis − That’s the Way it Is and you’ll see that in the couple months till those shows, Elvis and the TCB (Taking Care of Business) band had worked on it even more and, as a result, it sounded even better.

Sound like a lot of work? Something that took years for Elvis to build up the dedication to go over a song in rehearsal with a fine-toothed comb to perfect it? Well, no. Looking into Elvis’s past, we can see that he’d been like this years earlier.

When Elvis recorded “Hound Dog” in 1956, he went through 31 takes until he thought it was good enough to put out as a single. 31 takes! Think of going through one of your projects 31 times to get it right.

So, what am I saying? That you should go over something until you can’t stand it anymore. Perhaps not. But what I am saying is that Elvis kept himself to a standard. He would not stop practicing the same song until it was the way he wanted it to be. Then, coincidentally or not, it went out, people loved it as much as he did, and it became a hit. When you believe your work of a certain calibre and won’t settle for anything less, you are bound to keep that certain calibre of work because you wouldn’t submit anything less than that to the world. The higher that standard, the higher the calibre of work and the better the work, the more likely people will want to buy that work.

No, you don’t have to go into rehearsal for days going over a song. No, you don’t have to take 31 takes to have a song put out. But you certainly can go over something until it is a standard you find worthy of selling, enough that you would buy it yourself. Take it from Elvis, and your level of achievement will mirror it.

Elvis’s Lessons:

Ø Hold your work to the highest expectation and let nothing less be enough. Others will wonder why you are so good but you’ll know that your high standards are the ‘secret’.

Ø Keep on trying to improve your work, even if it doesn’t require improving immediately. Change happens one of two ways: you make it happen or it happens to you. It’s much less stressful and rewarding when you initiate change and improve in the way you want rather than being made to change by society and still not being on the edge of innovation.

P.S. If you're interested in hearing Elvis's performance of "The Wonder of You" from Elvis - That's the Way it Is, a couple months after the rehearsal discussed in this article, here's a link to a video of that scene.