By Doyne Phillips, Managing Editor for Southern Writers Magaxine
Growing up in the South you hear a lot of quaint
sayings. One I have heard many times is, “Dance with the one what brung ya.”
Proper English, no, but the meaning was well defined. I am sure that originally
it meant exactly what it states. You should dance with the one that brought you
to the dance. But it has evolved to mean stay the course with the talent,
process or system that got you here.
Many times we have a successful process and will
stray from it. In the world of sales they make a reference toward straying from
something successful like this by saying, “It worked so well we quit doing
it.” This sounds like it doesn’t make
sense and it doesn’t. But it happens time and time again. We find our groove,
our zone or process; enjoy our success then abandon the very thing that got us
here. Why?
Many times the change
comes from outside forces. Competition, the economy or technology can force us
to change or adapt the way we do things. That is understandable. But just as
often change comes from the inside. We begin to second guess our success and
think of ways to make it better. We may get lazy and take shortcuts or decide
to reinvent the wheel. Either way; we lose sight of what made us successful and
in changing it we lose it.
“More often than not the
process of refining an idea makes it vanish.”
Before we realize it our
success fades and we are left to wonder why. It is at this point we must
retrace our steps. We must consider we may have made a mistake with our
decision to change, or as the quote above says, we refined the idea to the
point it has vanished. Can this happen? Sure it can. Look at Facebook. In recent months the changes
Facebook has made with Timeline, and other bells and whistles, has many people
leaving Facebook. Is Facebook a great idea that has been refined to the point
it is beginning to vanish? The verdict is still out.
For the writer that has worked
hard and achieved success, it can be hard to continue dancing with the one that
brought you. We may be tempted to take the shortcuts or reinvent our writing
process. Outside forces can and will come into play as well but we must
remember our success and how we got here.
Do not stray
from success. Do not refine your idea until it vanishes. Instead, “dance with
the one what brung ya!”
