My happiness and fulfilment when it comes to blogging relies mostly on two things: how proud I am of the work I’m creating and sharing, and my perspective. When I start to lose perspective and shift into a mindset that isn’t healthy or productive, I can really struggle to maintain my focus along the way.
The actions you take during your first few months when starting something new have a major impact on your success or failure. Build positive momentum early on and it will propel you through your tenure. Make some early missteps and you could face an uphill battle for the rest of your time. The biggest challenge we face during these periods is staying focused on the right things. You are drinking from the proverbial fire hose while trying to get settled and figure out how to start to have an impact. It’s easy to take on too much or to waste your precious time. So, it helps to have a set of questions to guide you.
How do you put your writing out in public when there is a pool of strangers to judge? You’d think that after 2 years of public blogging and writing, I’d be completely free of fear when it comes to putting my writing out in public. You would, of course, be wrong. I still get little shivers of nervousness when I hit the “Publish” button on any post, and bigger fears still when I even think about publishing a book. Writing in public is like speaking in public, if you’re doing it right. You’re baring your soul for all to judge, and there are few things as scary as that. But I’m here to tell you that it’s not only doable, it’s worth the effort to overcome that fear.
Here is a hard thing to admit. Sometimes you are the most toxic person in the room. Sometimes, you have allowed the world to bring you down so much that you spew negativity. Sometimes you are the person being cruel to other people. Sometimes you are the person who ends up hurting the person who has done nothing but love you and look after you and be there for you.
“At some point, I realized that I had to give up other people’s definition of success. This is one of the most difficult things to give up because it is so deeply embedded in our cultural narratives that it becomes the standard by which we measure our lives. Even as entrepreneurs we have collectively agreed that fame and fortune are the markers of success.
