It is better to fail in originality
than to succeed in imitation.
Herman Melville
When you see someone handling a bad situation in a way that you admire, learn from it, take what you liked about their response, and make it uniquely your own. Develop your own personal strategies, responses, and approaches to dealing with negative situations or difficult people.
For example, if you like the way that John Wayne’s characters speak and handle themselves in his movies, integrate his slow, thoughtful tone and his self-confidence into your own personality. But do not try to be John Wayne. When you try to be or act like someone else, you appear awkward and unauthentic. On the other hand, when you take a trait or quality from someone you admire, and make it your own, it becomes a part of you.
Think of your favorite soup. It probably has many different ingredients, such as thyme, rosemary, salt, pepper, and other herbs. Each ingredient has a unique smell, texture, flavor, and purpose. But when you take that ingredient and add it to your soup, a transformation occurs. You can no longer separate all the herbs, the salt, or the pepper; they have simply become the soup. They are no longer separate ingredients but have combined to form something totally unique.
The same principle applies when you take a quality that you admire from someone else and make it your own. It becomes a part of who you are. And that is what you should do. Take the qualities that you admire in others, from wisdom literature, or wherever you find them, integrate them into your life, and make them a part of you. All of those qualities, along with those which are already exclusively yours, make you who you truly are. The combination makes you uniquely you.
