Entitlement is the way to failure
I’ve been thinking a lot about the Casey Anthony trial over the last few days. I’m not one of those people who watched it every single day and sweated over the piles of evidence more than the lawyers did. I would get little updates via Dateline MSNBC (a rather new guilty pleasure for me) or here and there on the news. When the jury recorded its verdict last week, I watched the announcements of innocence. I was confused. I was stunned. It seemed like OJ Simpson all over again.
As I have reflected more on both of those cases – OJ Simpson and Casey Anthony, I’ve moved away from the trials themselves to what could have gotten these 2 people to where they ended up. In both cases, I feel like a sense of entitlement led them both astray.
“I deserve to get whatever I want”
OJ Simpson was one of the best-known, most respected football players in the history of the game. He was a movie actor. He did commercials. He was the face of athletic magnificence and human joviality. He seemed approachable. He seemed to have it all. Was it this feeling that he had it all what brought him to a situation where he was being tried for the murder fo 2 people? Whether you think he did it or not, was it that sense of entitlement that made him beat up Nicole (which we know he did)? Was it that sense of entitlement that made him steal that stuff in Las Vegas, which he actually did get thrown into jail for?
And what of Casey Anthony? While we probably will never know the whole story, you get this sense from her that she had and maybe still has this sense of entitlement. Did she feel entitled to get her childhood because she had given birth so early? Did she feel entitled to get served by her family in every way possible because she they didn’t get along with her? You must have some sense of entitlement if you air all of your family’s dirty laundry (real or imagined) to help you win a trial case regarding the death of your daughter.
Entitlement in the online world
I feel like a lot of people have a sense of entitlement that they bring to the online world. People sniff around Facebook and Twitter and say, “Oh, well that person is making tons of money because of their online presence. I should be able to do that too.” The sense of the American dream – of going from “rags to riches” through hard work and dedication, seems to be dissipating. People are no longer willing to wait. if someone else has found success, they also want that success, and like the little girl from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Veruca Salt, they want it now.
Entitlement and Engagement Don’t Mix
If you bring with you a sense of entitlement to the online world, it becomes exponentially more difficult to engage in meaningful ways with people. You have a sense that you don’t need to spend time building the foundation of your community. You’re entitled to engage right away with the heaviest hitters. If you bring a sense of entitlement with you to the online world, nothing anyone ever does for you will ever be enough. If someone tweets out one of your posts you will not feel gratitude. You will only wonder why they just tweeted out that one. If someone doesn’t respond to you, you will become uncontrollably furious. You feel entitled to a response.
Entitlement may make you feel like you’re wearing rose-colored glasses, but really what you’re doing is putting blinders on to the value you could be getting out of the online world – if only you would put in the time. It is this blindness that can lead to your doom.
Patience is a virtue
I know it’s hard to see so many super successful people online, so many successes seemingly right within your grasp, yet so far away, like a mirage in the desert. But if you’re just getting started now, some of those folks have a 6-year advantage on you. They have a five-year advantage on me and I’ve been here for a bit over a year. Things are moving faster for us than it did for them. We’re able to grow faster. We’re able to achieve goals faster. But we still have to work for them. We still have to wait.
By the way, no one is really entitled to anything
My own life has taught me that even the most basic facets of life are not guaranteed to us. I’m sure there are lessons in your life that have you taught you the same thing. We are not entitled to all of our limbs. We are not entitled to have good health and the ability to walk and talk and hear and see. We are not entitled to roofs over our heads or jobs to go to.
This is not to be lamented. This is to encourage us to feel stunned with joy at what we do have, whether online or in the real world, and to enjoy the success of others, because they may be missing things that they feel entitled to. Things you have and perhaps take for granted.
Don’t bring a sense of entitlement to the online world. Engage with others. Strive for your goals. Put in the time and the effort and keep your eyes on the prize.
What do you think?
This is post #84 in The Engagement Series. Thank you for reading!
Image by Gareth Weeks. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/garwee
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Marjorie,
Wonderful. By the way, your last paragraph really kicked it. You are so right. When I started understanding and becoming easier on Twitter, I discovered Blue Key. There is absolutely nothing guaranteed on this planet or in our lives. Mother Nature wrecks whole lives on a whim, wars rage, children die. We have to be strong for the weak and for the beaten.
~Amber-Lee
I personally love that you got Veruca Salt in here.
It seems every day that I come across a Veruca Salt. It still seems amazing that people like that not only exist but that the masses of them are growing. Entitlement to me is another way of avoiding responsibility.
Years ago a wonderful man made mention about a situation and it stuck with me enough teach it to my children. The woman creating havoc said she could do what she wanted simply because she was an American citizen. His response to the whole fiasco happening in front of us was “Honey, it’s a privilege, not a right. There is a difference.”
Each of us must learn to work for what we want: it’s not guaranteed we get it simply because we want it. Kudos to those who don’t have to do that, but maybe they miss out on the satisfaction of knowing the joy of achievement.
I LOVED this post. So many great nuggets, but I would expand slightly on what Amber-Lee said above because I thought it was the last three paragraphs that really hit it, and not just the last one. Well done and well written.
I absolutely love it! Of course I’ve been thinking about entitlement lately – hence the pending mini series on it – but my conclusion is exactly yours – we aren’t entitled to very much and really need to take a step back and appreciate what we are given so freely. Entitlement irks me every time I see it and the woe is me, I’m a martyr, look how badly I have it irks me too – No single person is any more valuable or more entitled than the next.
Great post Margie and yes, flawlessly inserting Charlie and the Chocolate Factory reference with OJ and Casey Anthony is just writing brilliance. 🙂
What a wonderful post! Words of wisdom! There is so much to be said for humility, and very few people seem to understand that. I know my worth in God’s eyes, and who more than the son of God should have had some sort of entitlement, lowered himself to that of a servant for the sake of us all. So much can be learned from his life.
“Stunned with joy at what we do have…”
Now that would be truly abundant living, wouldn’t it? That sense of gratitude for even the simplest things that drives out the kind of comparisons, greed and self-centeredness that breeds entitlement mentality is so rare and so worth cultivating.
Thanks for these good thoughts.
Great post. I have been on twitter a few days short of 3 years now and it is amazing how much it has changed. From the days of the late-blooming early adopters to a place now flooded with celebrities and brand messaging. You are right on about the sense of entitlement some people have coming into this space. Its disconcerting to those of us that feel like twitter and fb and su are a second online home.
This is the exact problem I have with my bosses. They want to know how to get rich right away using social media. I keep trying to be reasonable and let them know that nothing comes overnight.
They don’t want to hear it. They want to get rich right away. We have other problems, like our website for example.
But that’s just me being silly 🙂
Wow – thought provoking, as always. And compels me to check my self- am I sometimes unconsciously bringing a sense of entitlement to my interactions? I hope not, but blind spots are called blind spots for a reason, right?
Thanks for making me think more deeply today…
Well done, Margie. I get frustrated sometimes when I throw something out and hear the crickets taunting me, but then I have to sit back and think of how many people are doing this, how many sites are out there, how many IRL people I have to bring to the table… and of course, how long I have been here myself (which is a drop in the bucket.)
I have never been accused of being the most patient person in the world, but I have hit some huge milestones in my short time, and I think I will be fine in the long run. I do need to be patient, though. I do need to be more engaging, and I definitely need to find the balance that lets me be consistent.
One day the crickets will no longer have a safe place to sit in front of me. No worries. 🙂
[…] friend Margie wrote a great article about Entitlement and Social Media that you should definitely check out, but before you head over there, make sure you subscribe to […]
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