298) Acting As If

(Mini aside - Ack, I cringe when I read cell phone posts the next day. So last minute, grasping and willy nilly. Apologies.)


(Language NSFW - get those ear buds in.)

At my last agency, one of their tenets was, "Act as if." Meaning, even if you're not sure or confident of what you're doing or saying, act as if. It will get you farther than you can imagine. It's not so much bullshitting your way through things, but having a synthetic air of confidence to mask your uncertainty.

It's amazing how much we act as if in life, if you think about it. Act as if something doesn't bother us, act as if we know where we're going. In addition, there's a whole culture of act as if-ers who believe that, "if we 'act as if' we already have something we want, 'act as if' something is already occurring in our lives (even if it's not), or 'act as if' we know how to do something (even if we don't) -- we create the conditions for it to manifest in our life with greater easy and probability." (Mike Robbins) Remember The Secret? Same idea.

"Acting as if" as a phrase gets a bad rap sometimes. It can be likened to one being delusional, or unrealistic, fraudulent, being something we're not. I've been wondering lately whether in some cases it's just better to admit unsureness, or raise red flags of our own shortcomings in a way that's productive.

But suppose acting as if does really lead you to...if?