You Can't Win Alone

Despite a weekend spent trying to keep The Lord from going to Fifth Paragraph (and thereby scaring the daylights out of everyone around him) this Election Day morning finds me in a supremely uplifted state of mind. No matter what Chicken Little has to say about this torpedoed economy, my bet is that once the election is over we're going to see a decided sense of relief and anticipation of what we need to do to get our country back on track.

For now, let me urge everyone to take some lessons from this remarkable campaign and how it can apply to all of us:

You Can't Win Alone. More than two years ago, both candidates sat down with their closest advisors and plotted their runs for the presidency. No matter what the goal, it's impossible to get there by yourself -- we all need strategists, connectors, mavens, thinkers, even 'Paul Reveres' to accelerate our drive and ambitions.

Know Your Narrative. We all have a story about what we do and why it matters but you must be able to articulate it. Telling your story in a way that encourages connectedness with your listener is perhaps the most critical aspect to why some people move faster than others.

Image Matters. This election wasn't just about the content but the context. The fact that Obama kept his cool (and looked sensational) when things heated up earned him the admiration and adulation of not only his base but the media covering him.

Confidence is Everything. No matter how the polls were trending, all of the candidates were serenely confident that they would prevail. Only in the last weekend when Senator McCain poked fun at himself on "SNL" did we see a chink in his armor.

There's No Such Thing as Anonymity. While 2008 is the year YouTube became a tool for political campaigning, someone is watching you and me -- all of the time. So remember that when you hold the door an extra second or grab the parking spot I've been waiting for.

Get a Campaign Song. I don't know about you but I'm certainly going to find a song that epitomizes everything I believe in. And when I find that song, I'm going to sing it, I'm going to hum it, I'm going to rock to it as I walk on and off the set of everyday life.