In today’s world, getting noticed seems to be a requirement for success. Years ago getting noticed wasn’t nearly as essential or paradoxically, as easy as it is today. Companies rely on the internet and often rely on a search engine ranking system or keyword ranking software to get their products and services noticed. Many years ago when people lived in small towns everyone knew how to find what they needed. They all asked Betty or Gertrude where to go to get the best stewpot. Everyone knew that Blacksmith John was best visited before 1:00, because later in the day he was wobbly with alcohol. These days the world is the village and getting noticed is like listening for a whisper in the middle of a NASCAR race. There is so much noise that sometimes the reason for making noise gets forgotten.

In an age of reality television and celebrities are nothing more than being in the spotlight, substance often turns up missing. A business axiom states, sadly not unfounded, that money follows name recognition. It has even invaded the world of information exchange with groups bent on getting a lie repeated so often it becomes deemed the truth. The world is filled with so much spin that knowing what is true and important is challenging to ascertain. Whole worlds are built on illusion and perception, people repeating something, or believing something that it becomes true, at least for awhile until the illusion collapses on itself. The housing crisis is a perfect example. This tendency isn’t new to human nature|, take the story of the Emperors New Clothes as indication that people have often been the victims of spin. The difference today is that there is so much media and so many ways to spin it that finding the truth becomes nearly impossible.

Finding worth in anything is a personal thing. So many people are driven by what is popular or what is accepted that few stop, breathe and ask themselves if it is true for them. The world has millions of great writers, amazing artists, extraordinary performers and phenomenal technology geniuses. Many times these are not the successful ones. The best at what they do are often brilliant for the sake of the craft. It is something they love with purity. On occasion fortune shines on them and success follows. Some are able to do the work and manage the business that lets their works earn a following. Far too often the great minds, the great works of art, the great moments of theater, are barely noticed. It is exciting and horrifying to think that the world has failed to benefit from a hundred Shakespeare’s and a thousand Van Gough’s.

There are a couple important aspects of this fact. First is the simple truth that if something is created to be seen, bought, or shared, it needs a forum and exposure. That is just common business practice. The more interesting revelation is that the world is chock full of astounding works as yet undiscovered and unshared. Most of what is making noise is everyone shouting about the naked Emperor pretending he is wearing fine garments.

If anyone starts thinking for themselves and says it doesn’t matter what others think, do I like this, does this move me, the wonders of the world multiply tenfold. Original thinking has become a rare and valuable skill.