Different

Don’t hide your quirks. Leverage them to your advantage.

When you’re young, tattooed, openly queer, and a woman of colour, it’s difficult to not construe any micro-aggression (or macro-aggression) as relating to one of the above characteristics that make me unique. It’s hard to let things go, not take things personally, and treat ignorant people with more respect than they afford to you. But, alas, I thought, that’s the price of being different.

On the other hand, being different has its benefits. In a male-dominated industry, male lawyers are taken aback at my directness, assertiveness, and, frankly, intelligence. And in a profession that relies on rules and expectations, I relish leveraging my uniqueness as a tool to cause uncertainty.

Aside from how I look, I also conduct myself differently: not may lawyers have blogs or blogs that are as informal as mine. Lawyers worry about their reputation and level of professionalism. I understand that. But some lawyers who have pristine (i.e. boring) social media profiles are some of the most unprofessional lawyers that I’ve encountered in real life. This is unfortunate and, frankly, a missed opportunity because writing on the side has real benefits to practicing law. You learn:

• How to write;

• How to craft stories;

• How to capture attention in a saturated market;

• How to define your personality;

• How to think different;

• How to get to the fucking point.

You would be surprised at the lack of these basic skills. And I was too until I started putting myself out there, on display for anyone with an internet connection to critique.

But the internet provides us feedback, if we have the humility to listen. What works, what doesn’t, what’s “meh.”

You don’t want to regurgitate the same information in the same way that other bloggers and writers do? Find another way.

You don’t want to spend your time driving traffic to your writing? Find another way.

You don’t want to work with nefarious companies but want to profit from your writing? Find another way.

Being different isn’t good or bad — it’s merely another way.

In a world of noise, lasting memorability is as important as the message itself.

Honour your differences. Showcase your differences. Leverage your differences.

I do every single day.

This story is published in The Startup, Medium’s largest entrepreneurship publication followed by 351,974+ people.

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