What Taylor Swift Taught Me About Scarcity, Abundance, and Tribes

A few weeks ago I wrote about how artists have to pay attention to their tribe, because their tribe, as it were, has changed over the last couple hundred years. We don’t have a gallery system like we did fifty years ago. You can’t just hope to “get discovered.” You can’t wait on an agent to do all the legwork for you, putting your art out in front of potential buyers.

You Have to Build Your Own Audience

I think of Taylor Swift. Sure, she has an army. She has professionals working for her. But there is so stinking much she does herself. She got where she is the hard way, by working hard. Say what you will about her and her music, but she works hard and she takes care of her fans. She was criticized recently for her op-ed in the Wall Street Journal where she talked about the future of the music industry.

While I won’t go into detail about her article, I will say that T-Swizzle knows her audience. She knows her fans, and she knows how to treat them. She knows her tribe, and she speaks with an attitude of abundance, not scarcity. She is confident they will be there, and they will, because she is good at what she does.

Listen to Your Tribe and They Will Take Care of You

And that’s what I want to get at. Not only do you have to understand your tribe, you have to have faith in them. I touched on this briefly when I was on the Dispatch podcast, about how you really have to listen to your tribe.

“You can observe a lot just by watching.” — Yogi Berra

Let me give you an example. In a recent edition of my newsletter I wrote about an artist friend of mine who listened to her tribe.My friend Mandy asked on Facebook, “Why am I writing thank you notes on notecards with somebody else’s stock photos?” Somebody chimed in and said, “If you put your art on postcards, I’ll totally buy them!” Sure enough, she went and added some new postcards to her Etsy page.

And when my mom saw this in my newsletter, she told me, “you need to do that, too!” And she’s right. There’s an opportunity that I should jump on.

That’s an example of listening to your tribe. There are a lot of opportunities there that you’ll miss if you’re not by paying attention. You learn a lot that way.

You’re One in a Million and That’s a Good Thing

My friend Jeff Goins put out a video recently advertising his online course Tribe Writers. He says, “you know how your mom always told you  that you’re one in a million? If that’s true, and there are 7 billion people in the world then that means there are 7,000 other people just like you.”

If you’re “one in a million”, and the world is full of seven billion people, that means there are seven thousand people just like you.

And that’s not a bad thing, because if you get your message in the right place, it will totally jive with 7,000 people.That’s a pretty good-sized army right there. If you can get half of those 7,000 people, you’ve got more than your 1,000 True Fans.

1,000 True Fans is an idea that says that you really need a tribe of 1,000 people who will support your work and keep you financially viable. If you are a musician, they will go to all your shows, buy all your CDs and t-shirts. The number isn’t the point. The point is you need a relatively small tribe. You don’t need to sell millions of copies to make it. 1,000 people is only 0.000014285714 percent of the world’s population. You don’t have to be a household name to be a success. Only about 1-2% of the population even watch the most popular shows on television.

You know how Andy Warhol said that in the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes? Sometime back in the early 2000s, I heard somebody say that because of the Internet, everybody is now famous to 15 people.

Except there are plenty of people out there to be famous to.

However, we live in a society whose economy is built on scarcity.

Our whole culture is built around scarcity. Now, scarcity is a real thing. Resources are finite, dollars are finite, and in reality there really are only so many potential customers. I’m not trying to get into a discussion of economics and government models, but the truth is that scarcity is a fundamental part of how we operate as humans.

But. There is enough to go around.

Really.

And I know this will sound kind of “woo-woo,” but if you approach life with an attitude of abundance instead of scarcity, it will open up so many new avenues, not just for business, but for friendship and your life!

Be Generous

If you approach life with the attitude that life has a lot to offer, you will become increasingly generous, and people will be generous back.

It’s one of those things that once you start doing it, it can’t help but spread.

Jesus said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10)

That gives me a lot of hope.

I’m not saying you have to give everything away in the hope that someone will buy something, but be generous because it is the right thing to do.

Abundance = Faith

If you live life from a point of abundance rather than scarcity, it will allow you to have so much more faith that God will take care of you. That’s really what it’s about. Having faith and believing that God will provide for you.

And you know what? God is the source of it all. Who’s to say he can’t provide everything? And he will!

My logic says that if you have a scarcity mindset, you’re not having enough faith in God. I’m not trying to belittle anybody, but that’s what it really comes down to!

I have to admit that it’s very easy for me to give in to the scarcity mindset. I have to intentionally practice abundance. I have to listen. What about you? What are some things you can do to get around this mindset?

(Here are some tips Michael Hyatt has shared on this very topic: Perceived Scarcity in a World of Outrageous Abundance)

Photo Credits: Sky Lanterns: Jirka Matousek via Compfight cc Gallery scene: Dom Dada via Compfight cc Andy Warhol: MEDIODESCOCIDO via Compfight cc