Moving Forward When Your Uninspired
I always tell my clients it REALLY doesn’t matter what you write about. The last thing you want is for your work to become a chore that you avoid. Sometimes though, it’s unavoidable. The solution, I think, is to push through. I know sometimes (personally) that it’s tempting to think you’ll have a change of heart or a revelation and you’ll go off in a new direction and have great success, but I’ve found and many other have as well that perseverance is key to winning the race. According to J. Paul Getty, he often bought oil wells that other had given up on. All he’d do is drill just a little bit further and hit oil. People would often give up when success was just around the corner. Today, I had no idea what to write, and I still don’t really, but I knew I had to write something. So here I am writing because really, I just have to. It’s not the best thing I’ve ever written, but I’m hopefully helping form a habit that will lead to more success. Honestly over the past few years I’ve had a great deal of success. Sometimes I just have to push through work and personal problems even when “my hearts not in it” and through all of that things are undoubtedly much better. I can barely keep up with things now. So keep walking. Keep blogging. “Un-slumping yourself is not easily done” as Dr Seuss says, but it can be done.
Procrastinating – Self Employed
You’re self employed or you’re a business owner/contractor. Your pay/how much you earn per year is based on how much you work. I get it. It’s a lot of pressure and it can quickly clog your mind. Like two many people trying to go through one door, or like traffic on the highway, things come to a stop. It’s an overwhelming and hopeless feeling. It only goes away if things keep moving. Btw, are you procrastinating right now? Quick tip. Stop reading this and get to work. If you’re kinda burnt out or just overwhelmed, here’s what I do. Do you have an ipad or a smart phone? Put on a program you’ve seen a million times before and just muddle through it. Put on music etc. I prefer shows because it’s a habit I can maintain. And I just put something on and work until I’m less overwhelmed and more on top of things. There are probably better habits, but it works in those really rough times. I work from home, but I imagine in a traffic jam this is what people do. They don’t park their cars, they listen to the radio or call a friend and they move at whatever pace they can until the day is done or until the traffic subsides. No more reading, get back to work. Don’t even get up to get coffee or water and don’t read the news or go on youtube. You won’t find anything helpful online. Just rabbit holes. Go put on your music or your show and get to work.
Who Made Business Boring?
There are people who can make the most dramatic, dragon filled, battle ridden, heart breaking tales boring. I think we have the same idea about work, or at least I did (and still do sometimes). Business and work don’t have to be boring if you are engaged. Someone once said “I want to know how many years of experience you have, not how many years you’ve been doing the exact same thing.” I’m a big fan of LOTR and the Hobbit. When you get to the end of those movies, you get a clear sense of wanting to go back to the tough parts and not wanting to even touch the end of the movies. You even get that sense at the beginning as Bilbo is writing his story. He longs to go back, finding that all the tough things he had to do really made the journey worth it. Frodo could have attempted to stay in the Elvin city and enjoy a leisurely life. But looking back, even though Hobbits are more sedentary in nature, not wanting to change, neither Frodo nor Bilbo would have been happy. I think they would have enjoyed it for a while, and perhaps would even try for a while to ignore the nagging feeling that there’s more out there. I think when you look at business that way, when you see it as trying to be comfortable or going through tough times, learning, growing and even getting into situation that can be very stressing and painful, you’ll find that you like it and come to miss it. Business isn’t boring. Trying to be comfortable is boring. Go learn. Don’t try to make enough to be comfortable, try to grow and do things and do a good job. Jump in and just keep walking. Through the fields, through the hills, mountains and swamps. For those who need more practical steps: read, call people, start a website, post on facebook and let people know you’re open for business, start a facebook business page, do a youtube video, take breaks and do physical activity, buy a few small things to make your business run better, then charge people for those premium features. That’s walking through the fields. They lead to hills and mountains. All movies have a beginning and in end. It’s what’s in the middle that makes them enjoyable.
Yes, Godaddy Really Does Suck
I’ve long held Godaddy as the gold standard of poor hosting. Their tech department is the only one I know of that can offer 4 contradicting explanations and solutions to the the same problem. It honestly doesn’t mater how many times you call their tech support, they will always give you a different answer and it’s normally a bad/nonsensical answer. The only on that’s outdone them (once) was Hostgator, but my understanding is that Hostgator has decent hosting whereas Godaddy ABSOLUTELY doesn’t. Godaddy’s hosting has never seriously ben ranked amongst the highest and apart from their control panel bing a disaster and a half, they nickle and dime you for things most hosting companies offer better version of. The reason I’m writing this now though is because it came to light that Godaddy, in addition to their poor technical skills has unsurprisingly ben storing peoples password in plain text. Something not even most n00bs do. https://www.wordfence.com/blog/2021/11/godaddy-breach-plaintext-passwords/ I have never once suggested anyone use Godaddy for hosting. You’r better off printing your website and stapling it to telephone poles. Just do a Google search for best website hosts and use any of them. My personal preference is Dreamhost and MAYBE A2 Hosting. Dreamhost is dead stable, normally ahead of the curve and great at what they do. A2 Hosting is general ahead of the head of the curve and constantly try to make things even better. Having talked to one of the higher ups at A2 Hosting, I can tell you that at this moment they are continuing to push the envelope.
When the Goal Train Gets Off-Track
What to do When You Get Derailed Cool picture huh? Pretty but accurate if you think about it. Though there’s a simplicity in meeting goals once they are set properly, it’s rarely a smooth ride and almost never goes as expected, and sometimes the destination doesn’t look like you thought it would. Still, you ned to accomplish what you’ve set out to do, unless it’s a bad idea, in which case don’t do it or do it quickly so you don’t sink too much time into it. Along the way, you’ll find urgent things come up. Family matters, money problems , urgent client related problems software limitation etc. This year, a lot of my schedule has been uprooted due to people becoming ill and some even passing away. These are things we have little control over. as hard as it can be to get into the swing of things, when it comes to goals, you rally can just hit the pause button and pick up on them. Like a word document, you save your progress and re-open it later when you’re ready to work on it. There’s no point in getting discouraged. Just get on with it. Pretend the delay never happened and pick up where you left off. Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making plans (a quote from a bunch of different people). It’s a normal thing that happens to even the most successful people. How many products are released late or released unfinished and ned patching up. When you pick up where you left off, don’t try to do everything at once, you’ll just overwhelm yourself. I normally just delay other things as much as possible and hen catch up. So whatever you can put on hold, put it on hold or delay as much as possible while you catch up on the goals you had to pause little by little.. Put in a couple extra hours and you’ll catch up before you know it. If you are REALLY far behind, count the goal period as lost, and restart a new timeline with the same goals. I set goals every 90 days. Recently I had to scrap a whole 90 day period, count it as nearly lost and start again. I’m still here, still working and all is good.
Successful Goal Setting – Part 2 – Goal Timeline
What are Your Goals? Assuming you know why and what you want to do, the next step is to set some goals for yourself. It’s important to note that there are different types of goals and not all of them need to be pursued as heavily as others. Lifelong goals like “climb Mount Everest” don’t need to be focused on every day for the rest of your life. You could use it as a motivator or a direction, but don’t use up much energy making it happen now. You may find it counter productive. There are a lot of things that will require your attention daily in order to achieve that goal. By focusing constantly on a large task, you may be discouraged in your day to day duties. Especially if he end goal seems large and daunting. Timing Your Goals So let’s break it down a bit. You have long terms goals and dreams. You have mid term goals you want to hit along the way that may or may not contribute to the long term goals. Then you have short terms goals, which many times are very urgent. I think it’s important to prioritize these so that you’re not spending more time worrying about tomorrow than you are working today. Today has enough worries to be honest, but your short terms goals should lead somewhere. Start by listing a few long term goals (5 or fewer). It’s ok if these change over time. Then move on to mid terms goals (2-10 years) (5 or fewer). Then go to short range goals (next year or so) (4 main goals). You can change these goals later if you just wan to use this as an exercise/practice. If you have more of these or you want more clarity, expand on the goals and then group the goals into similar categories. In the categories you can have short descriptions that include the breakdown. For example one goal could be to set up a website. Within that goal you need content, pictures, a logo and pricing for services. With the 4 short range goals, break them down and organize them into a logical chronological order if some goals need to be completed in order for other goals to happen. This will help you make sure that your goals are reasonable and obtainable. Quick check, try to make sure your goals line up in some way with each other or that they form something like a big picture. You may have to revise the whole list of goals once or twice (or as you go). What you want to break the year down into is 90 day segments and set 3 gals for each segment. You can have sub-goals, but just make sure your goals are attainable. BE SURE to use an app that counts down in DAYS so you can see the days ticking away. Here’s the app I use: Apple App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/countdown-star/id576177593 Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.joemerrill.android.countdownstar&hl=en_US&gl=US Then just make sure you have someone to check in with and be accountable to for each 90 day period. I can all but guarantee that time will all but fly when you do this, but you’ll find that your goals get done. and you’ll start moving your mountain! p.s. Be forgiving (to yourself) if you miss your deadline. I try to hit mine, but sometimes life hits back. If you go over the 90 days I suggest you just finish your goals then start on the next 90 days a little late. Someone else I know suggested you just move the unfinished goals into the next 90 days. Whichever works better for you, but be accountable.
Successful Goal Setting – Part 1 – Motives
Why do you do what you do? Here’s what this is intended to help you do: Get direction Gain momentum Use your time more efficiently / Help stop you from wasting time in the short and long run Set up the foundation for guiding principles in all the following steps Create consistency in your life and hopefully a happy future. Before you start any game and figure out a strategy, you aught to consider whether you like the game you’re about to play, and if you wan to play it at all. A lot of times I find myself wanting to do something because I feel the need to do it. I want to win at some game or do the best I can do on whatever project is in front of me, and that’s fine in some cases, and often has little influence on ones life. But what if it were something more important. What if it’s something you’re going to invest a lot of time into? What if it’s something that’s going to shape you in some way? Well… Then you aught to consider WHY you are doing it. Does it fit who you are and what you believe. I’m writing this to help you set goals. To accomplish something. This is not likely to help you on some one our project. One of the first things I learned about getting on track to set goals and accomplish what I wanted, was to ask myself “Why am I doing this?” and subsequently “do I want to do this?” If you’re going on a road trip to Alaska (or Hawaii for those of you who aren’t good with geography haha), I’d ask myself “Why Alaska?” and as a sub question “Do I really want to go to Alaska? It’s a long trip. Why am I doing it? Forget about the resources. I’m convinced that just about anything can be done, and that details can be worried about later. So for now, just ask yourself, “why?” IF what you’re going really fits who you are, what you want, what you believe, then it makes sense to move forward. I’d hate for you to get half way to your destination only to find out that you hate cold weather and prefer the tropics, or that you were only going because you felt pressured to go or didn’t know where else to go. There will be a lot of miserable people that would simply forge ahead for forging aheads sake. Hopefully you aren’t one of them. People like that seem to love being miserable, so maybe it’s the right choice for them? This is all just for people who want to pursue some goals in their lives. To be honest I think you could be happy and made a difference anywhere you go, but if you’re going to invest a lot of time into something, make sure your reasons are right. Some people I know what to be actors because they want the fame, but they hate acting. That’s a nice recipe for failure 🙂 Don’t do that. Start asking why and get your internal compass out. Then we’ll start working on a plan. The book that was recommended to me was “Starting with Why.” Here’s a link: https://www.amazon.com/Start-Why-Leaders-Inspire-Everyone/dp/1591846447 If find that you’re happy with the direction you’ve chosen, then you might be ready for step 2 (next week). If not, take a little time to think about why you do what you do. What motivates you and what kind of things you’d like to do that go along with your own internal workings. Take at least a day, maybe a week to think. Though failure is always a good option, it’s best to avoid having to turn back after embarking.
Warning! When to Ignore Warnings & Promises!
When a warning comes on a package or from some trusted source, you should pay attention to those warnings. A lot of times it’s the same with a promise. Bleach for example. Promise: Will whiten things. Warning: Don’t ingest, it’ll kill you. What happens when you get promises and warnings from sources you don’t know anything about. Like an email from some professional you’ve never met. Like this. Promise: We can get you to rank highly and give you a huge increase in customers. Warning: Google will kill you if you don’t fix these issues. It goes without question, you really should just ignore that email and just have a trusted professional look over your site for potential improvement or errors. What about the more subtle salesman? Not the spamsman above. A more subtle thing. Maybe an ad on facebook or something you found on Google. Someone who promises vague improvement and lets you draw the conclusions about what can be gained and what you’re going to lose. Never the less, it’s some sort of miracle cure for your ailing business, or maybe if your business is well, it’s a chance for you to get richer quicker. What do you do then? All the success stories I know of consist of consistent improvement over time. No shortcuts. Just doing what needs to be don according to well established standards. I know… Boring right? Like eating veggies and getting sleep. But the sooner you integrate those boring aspects (perhaps in an exciting way if you want. That’s my approach) the sooner you can reach your goals. EXAMPLE: Blogging is a good way to keep your site active. Most people don’t do it because it’s tedious and they think they have to write some profound thing each time. I tell people, write about whatever you feel like writing about. It doesn’t have to be long or short or about your business if you don’t want it to be. Just do it. So the next time you get a warning about your website being a catastrophic disaster from someone you don’t know or you get a promise of unimaginable success from an add or maybe you get an email about yet another millionaire in Nigeria who wants to give you his money, maybe just ignore and think to yourself “What boring thing am I forgetting to do?” Or “Have I recently ignored a professionals opinion recently because I know better than they do?”
Grow
This is just kinda fun really. I honestly forgot why I started this post. Good thing I left this link in it as a reminder. https://www.16personalities.com/free-personality-test I took this test and found parts of it to be accurate. It helped put into words and really help cement the idea that I need help in certain areas. There’s an old saying right? You’re only as strong as your weakest link. What if you could hire someone to be that link for you. That is to say, what if your weakest point could just be outsourced to someone else? You’d be a lot stronger. If you know your failings, take the test anyway and then think about who you are working with now (or who you aren’t working with) that could help fill the voids. You want to provide a good service. If I wanted to bake cakes, but I was terrible as making good flour, I’d either buy the flower or hire someone or some service to make it for me. I know I’d feel more special if I made the flower, but let’s be honest, the cakes would suck. That’s not to say I can’t learn more as I go, but I don’t want to be selling people something that isn’t good. Period. Are you cheating others, or yourself, by not accepting that you can’t do everything?
Outsourcing & Partnering
Do you ever feel like you wear too many hats? That you spread yourself too thin focusing on aspects of your business or your life that you really don’t know much about? If you do, then you know the feeling you get when you are doing something to “save money” or perhaps “keep more” of the money from a project. You go over and over the thing you’re working on (that isn’t your specialty) to make it as good as the rest of your project (which is your specialty) all the while you watch the hours tick away. You stay up late (or get up early) to compensate. In reality, while your intentions are good, you’re wasting time and lowering the quality of the overall project. Don’t believe me? Make a short version of whatever you’re working on (be it a video, a photo, an audio recording, content or pricing or maybe even sales). If it’s a 30 minute video, for example, take the intro or one of the complicated parts, go on Upwork and ask someone to give you a sample of what they can do with it OR give them $50 to get a good quality version to you and compare what you did to what they did. Don’t you think the client would prefer their video over yours? Let’s take a quick look at the pros and cons. Pros Cons Back to the practical application The video example above. Think how long would it take you to make that $50 back doing what you do best (your area of expertise)? Yes, you’ve used money, but you can make more now. Consider your hourly pay. Let’s say you have a project or a service you are providing and you make $100. You can do it on your own and it’ll take you 30 minutes to do the things you know, but it takes you 2 hours and 30 minutes to to do the part you don’t know how to do very well. Congrats, you only made $33.33 an hour. Now let’s say you spend 20 minutes on the part you know and spend $50 + 10 minutes of your time (for easy math) outsourcing. You made $50 an hour and you have 2 hours to spare, which you can now use on other projects. There are times, especially in the beginning when you have to do things by yourself, just so you can figure out what needs to be done, but once you know what needs to be done, there’s no reason to continue struggling with tasks you aren’t so great at. Let’s face it, you’re also producing a lower quality product. If you don’t realize that, then you’re either working with the wrong people or you likely have an overly high opinion of yourself. I know you might also enjoy doing things yourself and there’s a satisfaction in doing it yourself as well, but let’s be real. It’s a lower quality product overall because you could be spending MORE time performing your specialty. (don’t worry, you can still be well rounded and a specialist). That alone creates a better product. You’re also wasting time by not working wisely. That’s something you cannot get back and it’s something that is finite. Every day has the same number of hours in it (weeks too) and no mater how hard you work, you can’t change that. What does outsourcing/partnering look like? Ok, so now that you know it’s reasonable to outsource or find a partner to work with (whichever you prefer). It may not look like what you think it does. In my case it looks like this. I go to Upwork, I look for a specialist, reviewing their reviews and sampe work, and I say “I am redesigning this site. I need you to transfer all the material from site x to site y. How much will this cost?” Sometimes I create a base design prior to the transfer so that the person doing the transfer can put the content into the new design. That’s normally the case for bigger projects. To get to that point I needed to know specifically what I needed, what was more or less the best order to do it in and where to look. What this may look like for you. In your case, it may be like this “Hey, I need help with my website. It’s not performing well and needs some updates. I’d also like it to perform better. What can be done?” In this case, you don’t even need to know what needs to happen. You just know what you want to happen. Before you know it, and sometimes it’s little by little, you have a specialist working on your website, it’s performing better and it’s reached heights you never new it could. In many cases you can even say “Hey, this is my budget, let’s prioritize.” Believe it or not, that’s outsourcing. That’s partnering. What can I outsource? Well, I don’t like billing, book keeping and taxes. I outsource that to a CPA. I also find that, in all honesty, I’m a better advisor than I am a sales person, so I let other people sell my services in return for a small fee. That can be expensive but in all honesty, I partner with very talented people who share my values and I get tremendous/wonderful clients that I couldn’t imagine not having having. Editing and proof reading is also a good thing to outsource. You can also meet with someone and outsource the task of finding what to outsource. You would be outsourcing the process of finding out how to make your business more efficient. You may want to outsource you strategic planning. I have an advisor that helps me with that (he’s on the home page). THIS however is more difficult for some people because you have to find someone who fits your values and then accept that THEY KNOW BETTER THAN YOU DO! Or at
