Dance, and Keep Dancing
This is how things change:
First, there's one guy dancing, and people think, "He's kinda weird." They walk right by, pretending not to see him. The dancing guy could stop, but he doesn't...until a second guy joins him, and the ball starts rolling. It takes vision to be the first one, and also determination, but it also takes courage to be the second. [Be sure to watch to the end]
I know this is an oft-referenced video in business books, but nevertheless very few people, in business or otherwise, seem to apply it to their own behavior. Instead, they keep thinking that if they continue to do it the way everybody else does, the way they've been told things work, they will eventually succeed. Finally, they give up in despair, tell themselves that they just weren’t good enough or not lucky enough, and then (in the case of theater people) they go into higher education, where they teach their students the same damn thing that didn't work for them. It is _The Myth of Sisyphus_ of theater education.
In a 2023 tweet that led to the 2025 National Book Award winning One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been against This, author Omar El Akkad wrote, “One day, when it’s safe, when there’s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it’s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.” I’d argue that the reverse is also true: one day, when there is no risk, people will have always been for the change that they resisted when it was starting. I guess it’s just another way of saying it, really.
Buckminster Fuller said "Dare to be naive." Start there. The dance that they guy is doing is definitely not cool, but it’s just the way he feels like dancing. The guy in the video is enjoying himself—that’s the second key: do what you’re doing with joy. Third, he clearly has no interest in what other people think of him—so, pay no attention to naysayers. Fourth, keep doing it. As long as you believe in what you’re doing, keep doing it. Fifth, embrace the second arrival. Going back to Buckminster Fuller, he is also quoted as saying, ""You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
In other words, dance and keep dancing.