No One Really Cares

This essay was written for the Makers of Sport® newsletter in November 2015. Monday Musings and Weekend Reads were the written editions of the newsletter that accompanied the podcast; the archived email is on Mailchimp. The newsletter's links and announcements are trimmed here.

I mentioned in a previous newsletter that I coach youth sports and love it. It can be stressful at times but it really teaches me patience. Herding other parents' kids is a real art form and I have the up-most respect for teachers that do it day-to-day and deal with disrespect from today's kids. Anyhow, it's youth basketball season and I am coaching my 2 sons once again in their preschool/kindergarten league. I have this one parent who really bugs the living hell out of me. Let me start with this...I'm 6'4". I tell you that because this parent is about 5'6" and is constantly texting me messages about "what we need to work on" and that I might need to play his kid a lot because we have so many young kids that can't shoot. Mind you, his son is 6. Six years old! This poor (and he really is sweet) boy may quit growing like his daddy or decide one day he likes music more than sports choosing to focus on something else.

I'm well aware of said parent from soccer season, constantly bragging how good his team is, playing his defense right in front of the 4 year old goalie who physically isn't strong enough to throw or punt the ball anywhere but to his team for another goal and megaphoning how at some Brazilian football camp the coach said his son had great potential and couldn't believe he was 5 years old (at the time).

For this basketball season, we have designated Tuesdays and Thursdays for practice for multiple reasons. We set specific times because we have to share the court with other teams and it's good to get it in the parents' already busy schedules. Recently, I got a text from Youth Sports Dad and he asked if we could reschedule practice because his son couldn't make it. Sorry sir, I'm not rescheduling practice for 9 other families because your 6-year old prodigy can't make practice. I don't care what you have going on.

We all know this type of person. It almost seems like this person is a parody, but yet they are real.

So why am I telling you this story? To put it bluntly, no one really cares about you and your thing. No one out there in this big ole digital world really cares that much about what you do. I'm speaking strictly from a professional perspective. Of course your family and friends love you. In using the metaphor of Youth Sports Dad, the child in this scenario is your project. Maybe that side project you were working on. Maybe it's some project you created for your job. Perhaps you got a bit of shallow praise when you got it done on time or you received a few artificial Facebook likes, but now it's time for the next thing. People have forgotten the other thing and they're onto something else. The world unfortunately is very self-oriented.

Very rarely do projects happen where people genuinely care about "the thing". People most of the time want to know, what's in it for them? Think about how many times someone asked you to re-tweet something, buy something or do something for them (that had something to do with their project). And you just thought, "nah there isn't anything in that for me". We've all done it.

Even with this podcast, I ask for a review every episode, yet only have 70ish reviews on iTunes. And it gets 1000+ downloads per month!

People will say they care about things over and over because that's easy and it gets you off their backs. But once you ask something of them — no way. They don't have time.

[By the way for those of you that have left reviews, shared the show and actively engage with the podcast, I am eternally grateful. I take time to remember and know each of you digitally and some have developed into personal friendships.]

We all need to take time to care about things other people are working on. Not for everyone and not for everything, but that colleague of your's that has been asking you to review their work, do it. Or that Twitter friend that desperately needs you to favorite their post, do it. Take some time to really pay attention to things your favorite makers are making and be sure to let them know you care about it. Do something for them without them asking. Buy their product, share their Facebook page, favorite or comment on their work.

And if it's you that are making things that no one allegedly cares about (yet), keep going. Listen to your gut. If it's time to give up and move onto the next thing, then have at it. But, if your heart is still in it, keep grinding. Sometimes we have to selfishly create for ourselves instead of placing our creative integrity into empty Facebook likes, Dribbble favorites or Twitter re-tweets.

Cheers,

Adam