How To Win Reputational Victories

The coin that buys commitment

Iffy and I doing a human Turkish getup (back fly variant)

Partner acrobatics is won by reputation.

You might imagine skill and fitness are the limiting factors, but like most non-solo human endeavors, it hinges on collective commitment to a common goal.

Weak commitment is often the shoddy foundation sabotaging beautiful acrobatic movements built with hard-won skill and strength. And this hesitation is reasonable; when commitment might lead to catastrophic injuries, everyone should be picky.

But hesitation circles achievement in an unending dance. The first must recede for the later to make headway.

Tipping the scales between the two is reputation, which we drag into our shared doings like an inescapable (but sometimes obscurable) ball and chain. A good one buys commitment from others. A bad one repels. So powerful is rumor that buy-in may be achieved or forsworn before a meeting even takes place.

I’ve had potential business clients want to hire me without encountering my work. I’ve had acrobats from other states and countries come for coaching while swinging through Texas, though they’d never met me. How did they find me? Someone I’d never met saw me perform or teach once and told them about a move I do, or a ghost-writing client shared that I’d written “their words.” This is my reputation doing leg work for me, but it works the opposite way too. A bad reputation can sink almost any non-solo endeavor.

Reputation is magic. Reputation is wealth. Reputation is the key to many doors. And I find this very troubling, since reputation is the most unreliable thing of all.

Commitment vs Hesitation

Hesitate in acro and safe moves become dangerous. Hold back, and the human body will not balance no matter how hard you strain.

The top photo shows my friend Iffy and I halfway through a Human Turkish Getup, which is not a high-skill move by acro standards. It demands strength and shoulder mobility from the base and some core stability from the flyer, but limited technique.

And yet you’ll find flyers with strong cores who can’t fly the move because it requires commitment. The legs want to drag the body downward (where it’s safe). Only by arching and throwing the head and arms back is equilibrium achieved.

But most people have an aversion to this vulnerable position. If the base messes up at the top of the move, the flyer will plunge head first toward the ground from eight feet up. Only by turning down anxiety and trusting will the move succeed. But when trusting, disaster looms.

Iffy committed to a “death drop.”

Similarly, the aptly named “death drop”, starts with the flyer handstanding on the base’s hands (hand-to-hand). They’re tossed, plunge downward, and are snatched from the air by the hips before their head hits the ground. If the base knows what they’re doing and the flyer is committed, it’s very safe. The crowd gasps, then cheers. Everyone goes home happy.

If the flyer doesn’t commit and try to “move themselves,” to safety, aka, flail around in the air, disasters are possible.

In acro, business, war, and most relationships, this dynamic reigns. At the very least, a lack of commitment will keep everyone spinning their wheels. At the worst, lives and fortunes are on the line. Reputational victories matter.

Building Reputation:

I’ve been thinking about reputation because my eight-year amateur acro partnership with my friend Iffy is coming to a close, or at least shifting to a new intermittent phase. She’s moving away at the end of the year, and I’m feeling a bit nostalgic and sad.

We’ve taught, performed, and had fun together pretty seamlessly in a dynamic where egoic conflict, injuries, and bickering often drive partnerships toward the rocks.

Beyond better-than-average communication and random compatibility, I think there’s something specific at the heart of our successful partnership: Iffy knows I’d see my body smashed to ruin before I let anything happen to her.

In fact, I find it uncomfortable how much she trusts me. She has a higher opinion of my abilities than I do. Her trust makes me want to be better, and I think I am better because of it.

But my dedication to protecting Iffy’s mortal coil isn’t a universal priority in acro, as Iffy will tell you. She’s picky about who she’ll work with because many bases treat her like a prestige object to be tossed around so they can look cool. She’s hit the ground hard many times. She’s been injured, sometimes in ways that were almost very bad. Flyers learn to be cautious or they won’t be flying for long, and being cautious means playing the reputation assessment game.

You don’t need to look far in acro to see the cost of bad reputations. A base I know is having trouble finding skilled partners to work with, but his own skill and safety aren’t the issue. He gained a reputation for trying to sleep with a few too many flyers, and for botching those relationships. Word gets around. He seems to be turning over a new leaf, and I expect his reputation will recover. Time and consistency have power, but it’s not always so simple.

Reputation Is a Wild Animal:

“…each man is worth just as much as the things he cares about.”
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 7.3

Playing with centrifugal force.

Reputation is a wild animal. You can try to tame it. You can be consistent, ethical, and well-intentioned. But some day, it may decide to maul you on a whim.

Reputation is correlated with reality, but often wildly off base. Fate and those with malicious intent skewer reputations with ease.

• Socrates was arguably the most ethical man in Athens, but the Athenians believed the false picture spread by morally flexible men, and they killed him because of that delusion.

• Many modern whistle blowers are motivated by justice and truth but face financial and reputational ruin for doing the right thing.

• The #MeToo movement surely brought down some horrible people that deserved to be exposed, but the he-said-she-said nature of that justice should make us all a bit queasy.

Over 15 years of self-employment, I’ve had two clients make public complaints over unreasonable demands that were outside the scope of promised work, or just plain lies. I was powerless to do much about it. The public isn’t going to do a deep dive to learn the truth. They’ll see controversy and stand clear. I was lucky enough to survive those occasions with my business intact, but it was dicey.

And what of acro safety? When I’m on stage — unsteady with nerves, hands slick with sweat, the blare of music so loud I might miss a cue — all my caution might mean nothing. I’m hardly immune to mistakes, and I’ve made plenty. One day, one may truly be bad.

What would result from such a mistake? I might be made a pariah if the mistake was bad enough, though my underlying approach to safety and ethics would be no different than when I had a great reputation.

All this is unfair, and we can do nothing about it. It’s a problem as old as time.

Philosophy’s Rejoinder:

If you are ever tempted to look for outside approval, realize that you have compromised your integrity…if you need a witness in addition, be your own; and you will be all the witness you could desire.” — Epictetus, Enchiridion, 23

True delusion is thinking we earned our good reputations and what stems from them. Look again and you’ll see them bubbling up from the same ignorant mob that will turn against us tomorrow. Opinion is at best a half truth, a rough sketch of a person’s character. Reputations are not us — they’re often ugly and not worth chasing.

When grasping after what good reputation brings, their loss hangs over our heads like the sword of Damocles. This forces us to live constrained, defensive lives. A Life spent jealously guarding our joys and grasping for more is no life at all. It turns existence into a hell of anxiety and not-enoughness.

As with so many things, I’ve come around to the perspective of the philosopher-emperor Marcus Aurelius, who was maligned in his own time.

“Reputation, in such a world, is meaningless. …What is enough? …to do good to others, and to treat them with tolerance.” — Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 5.33

The one thing we have complete control over is how we respond to what happens to us. This is virtue. I must of course treat others well, but only because that is good in and of itself. This might accidentally lead to happiness, good reputation, and other pleasures, but as many have found, doing the right thing often backfires, so it’s a crap shoot.

Valuing reputation and extrinsic outcomes means being beholden to the mob’s delusions. We can’t help but go astray from this position, since we’ll concern ourselves with the appearance of right-action instead of right action itself.

This may seem an inescapable morass, a depressing truth about human foolishness. I’ve come to disagree. There is something so deeply satisfying about concerning myself only with what I completely control — doing the right thing. The more I devalue consequences, such as the fruit of my reputation, the happier I seem to be. Even considering this reframe in any troubling situation brings me relief. Suddenly, the way forward seems clear and less stressful.

Fate may destroy my public reputation tomorrow, but what will remain is my reputation with myself, something I’ve come to care about a great deal.

This is unlike so much of life. It’s immune to luck and slander. I might lose public regard, but if I still have self regard, I’ll be earning points in the only game worth playing.

This is what a true reputational victory looks like.

The Only Game Worth Playing

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