Life is a journey of self-discovery – as an Advocate, you know this better than anybody. All of us grope through the darkness of life, illuminating the way with the lights we find within: our inner knowledge is our strength.
This self-knowledge comes easily to an Advocate, which is why others can seem so mysterious at times, their motives so unclear. Where the chief problem of others seems to be deciding what they want out of life, an Advocate’s is the opposite: we often know exactly what we want – but how do we achieve it?
Maybe you changed majors again and again in college – maybe you went to college, dropped out, went back – maybe you bounced from one job, one career, to another and to another, never quite happy where you were. Maybe you’ve been called indecisive, when all along you knew that what you wanted was simply something you hadn’t found yet.
There’s an old story that applies very well to the situation you have probably found yourself in:
Once, a man found an eagle’s egg and decided to place it into the nest of a prairie chicken. Eventually, the egg hatched along with the rest of the chicken’s eggs, and the mother chicken began raising the baby eagle as her own.
For years, the young eagle, convinced it was a prairie chicken, did exactly as its “siblings” did. He scratched in the dirt for worms; he copied their clucking; he never flew more than a few feet off the ground.
Eventually, the eagle, now very old, saw a great bird flying far above him in the blue and cloudless sky. Soaring with majesty and grace, the glorious bird had the eagle spellbound.
The eagle turned to one of its siblings, scratching in the dirt nearby. “What an amazing bird!” the eagle said. “What is it?”
The sibling clucked, “An eagle, king of all the birds. But don’t worry about it. He has nothing to do with us. Just be happy where you are.”
The eagle, believing his sibling to be wise, immediately put the majestic bird out of his head, never thinking of it again for the rest of his days.
The eagle died, still thinking it was a prairie chicken.
An Advocate is a rare bird, indeed – making up only 1 to 2 percent of the population, it is no wonder that many Advocates, surrounded by so many people who are so unlike them, begin to feel lost. Some struggle for much of their lives, trying to be something they’re not, while all the while, a better life is just out of reach.
After countless hours spent on hundreds of surveys, hundreds of stories submitted by Advocates, we began seeing patterns – strong-willed, passionate, creative, giving individuals who nevertheless felt like something was missing.
They wondered why all their hard work in the service of others went unnoticed – why their “slow and steady wins the race” approach was ignored in favor of quick-fix solutions that all too often fell apart soon after implementation – why the values of others were so different from their own.
In short, they felt like failed chickens, and though they knew, deep down, that they were simply a different breed of bird, with no eagles around to look to for guidance, how could they have expected anything else?
As an Advocate, you know yourself, but knowing how to navigate the world at large, an eagle among chickens – that part doesn’t come as easily.
There are no roadmaps on life’s journey. But by learning from the successes and failures of others, others who share our own inner selves, we can come one step closer to making the most of our potential.
And that’s just what our premium profile contains – insights into the inner life of an Advocate, gathered from interviews with hundreds of people who have felt as you have felt, struggled as you have struggled. No matter where you are in life’s journey – whether you are fighting to be accepted or simply fighting to accept yourself, your unique strengths and capabilities – you are sure to find value in learning how others have grappled with these questions of self, and what answers they’ve found.