Welcome to the blog
This is my blog archive. My new writing lives on Substack.
The Crossroads Between Security And Freedom
In April, I started my leap. For 6 months I would be on leave from my 9-5 job to try to take my business full-time. The goal was always to turn my creative business from a small side business, to something I could keep doing full-time. But I knew there was a big chance I wouldn’t get all the way in 6 months time.
At the end of summer, a little over a month left of my 6 months, I knew I had to choose. Would I go back to my job, maybe fewer days a week, or would I keep going full-time? Neither option was perfect, and I found myself at a crossroads between security and freedom.
The Scarcity Mindset I Didn’t Know I Had
Impatience is fear, I wrote in my notebook a couple of weeks ago. But it would take another month of being a full-time business owner before I realised that impatience isn’t just fear, it’s scarcity.
Building my business is opening my eyes to just how much of a scarcity mindset I’ve had around my business, and how it’s been limiting the options I see for myself. I’m starting to see that there’s a different way - one of abundance. This is quickly becoming my biggest mindset shift yet of my 6 month business leap. And it’s one that is long overdue.
What To Do When Your Creative Goal Feels Impossible
Recently I had that feeling again. Impossible. My summer vacation was nearing an end much too soon. (How is it that vacations always feel so long when they begin and before you know it they’re over?) I hadn’t made all the progress in my creative work that I had hoped to make. I saw autumn creeping closer. I looked at where I was and where I want to get to, and the road between felt so very long. It was like time was running but I was standing still. How would I ever get there? Impossible.
I think this is a feeling that most creatives deal with now and then, especially if you’re trying to do something for the first time. We can see clearly where we are now, we can dream up a destination but the road in between is fuzzy, perhaps a bit scary and so terribly long. We might as well be trying to fly, that’s how likely a successful outcome feels.
Ridding ourselves of these feelings completely isn’t very likely - it’s human to doubt. What we can do is to learn how to deal with them, when they invariably turn up.
Dealing With Fear Of Failure In My First Month Of Business
I want to tell you a story from my first month of running my creative coaching business. I want to tell it because I know that the fear of failure holds many of us back in our creative lives. It held me back when I started writing my first novel, and I wouldn’t be where I am today if I hadn’t dealt with that fear.
In my first month of business, I had another round with that fear, in its new shiny shape: the fear of failing as a creative business owner.
Ideas that scare the pants off of me and how I approach them
My creative life began in 2016 with a year long challenge: to face my creative fears. If you think that means I’m now fearless, I’ll have to disappoint you. But my fears have changed, and there are new things that scare me now.
In in the end of 2018 when I looked back on the year and set my intention for 2019, one thing stood out to me. There were again ideas I never got around to doing, and just like before it was because they scared me.
What I learned from one year of facing my creative fears
The idea of facing my creative fears during 2016 came out of the realization that I would never create unless I dealt with the reason I wasn't creating: fear.
When I set out on my Fear Year, I didn't have a list of fears and I didn't plan my year. I trusted that fear would show me the way forward, and it did.
This is what happened, and what I learned from it.
Dear Doubt. I'm breaking up with you.
This is a letter to my self-doubt, looking back on our relationship and what has lead me to this decision: I'm breaking up with Doubt. I have met someone else - Creativity.