Tag: making a change

Starting Fresh

I can’t eat
wheat products anymore.

So I am baking
with almond flour.

Almond flour,
according to
the suppliers’ claims,
can be swapped
1:1
with regular flour.

I did that
in my existing recipes.

That change was a disaster.

I could tweak those recipes
to make the almond flour work.
But that’s a lot of work.

It is much easier
to discard the old wheat flour recipes
and use recipes
already altered for the almond flour.

We all make this similar mistake.
We try to make
a new reality
fit into our old lifestyles.

We work from
9 to 5 on our businesses
even though
our customers
prefer we work
from 5 to 10.

We ‘pay’ ourselves
on Fridays
even though
that’s one of the busiest days
at the bank
and we could pay ourselves
at any time.

We eat a sandwich
for lunch
even though
we work at home
and could eat ANYTHING
we wanted.

Let go
of habits
that once worked for you
but now make your life harder.

Start fresh.
Use a new set of
‘recipes’
designed for your new situation.

Spring And Starting New Projects

Spring is a time
of baby squirrels
and newborn robins.

It is a time
of budding maple trees
and sprouting daffodil bulbs.

It is a time
for starting fresh,
for change,
for hope.

Harness that optimism.
Hitch onto that momentum.
Start that project
you’re passionate about.

There is change all
around you.
Contribute your own change
to the chaos.

Take action today.

The Same Thing Every Day

When many people
think of
starting a business,
they think of the big events
– the first spark of an idea
for a product/service,
the finalization of the
first product/service,
the first shipment,
the first store opening,
the first sale.

Those are all
super exciting times.
They are the highlights.

But they are rare.

The majority of time
business building is
a slow slog.
It is unlocking the same office
at the same time
to do the same thing
every day.

Most of the work is
boring and monotonous.

But that work is needed
and that work makes a difference.

As Seth Godin
shares

“If you care,
keep talking.
Keep acting.
Stay focused.
And don’t get bored.”

Making a difference
often means
doing the same things
and
saying the same things
over and over.

Embrace that reality.

If It Happens Often…

A writing buddy
is trying to get out of
her publishing contract.
She claims the Korean publisher
is cheating her.

The issue is…
she has made this claim
with so many other publishers,
she has a reputation
in the industry.
North American publishers
will no longer deal with her.

The first time
this happened,
I looked at her publisher
with suspicion.

Now, I assign
the situation fully to
my writing buddy.
Either she’s a bad judge
of partners
or
she has serious trust or other issues.

If a bad situation happens to me
again and again,
it is likely caused by me,
by something I’m doing
or some skill I don’t have.

It is a me problem.
If I don’t want it to happen again,
I have to figure out a way
to fix it.