Escaping Mediocrity

This is Day 18 of 30 Days to Changing Your Game. Yesterday Jeffrey Summers gave us an amazing, straight forward, print-it-out-and-tape-it-to-your-wall checklist for making change stick.  Today Elizabeth Potts Weinstein is getting down to the nitty gritty of exactly what to do – right now – today – to get this gamechanging thing off the ground. Most you know she is my BFF. Today’s post will give you a lot of insight into WHY that is. Enjoy!

Be Scary, Unfriend, and Jump in Puddles: What to Do on Day 1.

by Elizabeth Potts Weinstein (@ElizabethPW)

It’s 9:00 AM on the day when you’ve decided to finally follow your passion, create a real business that makes money and changes the world, fully embrace living your truth.

Awesometastic!!!

You got a fresh new stack of florescent post-it notes on your desk. Three of your favorite pens lined up in front of you. A new journal and fresh blank calendar. A beautiful vision board and a mission statement and set of goals for this year.

You turn on you computer.

You stare at the screen for 5 minutes.

And since you have no idea what you are supposed to do next, you check twitter. Or facebook. Or start relentlessly hitting “get new mail” in your email program.

Because you have absolutely no idea what you are supposed to be doing this morning.

Here’s the thing: it’s all nice and good for me to tell you – Live Your Truth! Find Your Tribe! Be 100% Yourself 100% of the Time! You Can Have a Business That Makes Money And That You Love! - but how the do you actually do that?

What do you do that first morning when you’ve decided to change every freaking thing in your life?

1. Take Immediate Action on Your Most Scary Idea

In June 2009 I woke up at 5:30 in the morning (for those of you who read my blog, yes, that’s a reoccurring theme) with the idea for The Live Your Truth Project. Interviewing amazing entrepreneurs on how they live their truth. Whatever that means.

It sounded so scary – asking people I admire to help me. Trying to explain what they heck this project was when I didn’t even know myself. Finally sharing with a piece of the world what was secretly going on in my head.

I so wanted to just get back into bed & let it go to another day. But I had committed, to myself, to be okay with being uncomfortable. To take big scary action. To change everything.

So I sent out three emails asking some friends to be my first three interviewees. And asked them for introductions (asking people for help! scary!) to other cool people who would also be a great fit.

Even though I didn’t have a sales page. Or know what this thing would be about. Or have any real information to give them.

That’s the secret — the moment you are inspired with an amazing, horribly scary idea, take the very first action step.

Even if you don’t know the second action step.

Especially if you don’t know the second action step.

You can decide later if you really want to do the project. You can figure out later what steps 2 through 127 are going to be.

But today, sitting here right now, just take the first step that connects this project to the outside world. Announce it to twitter. Make a phone call. Schedule the meeting. Ask for help.

Don’t think. Get in motion. Right now.

2. Say No to Something That You Allegedly Should Be Doing.

Maybe you have no idea what you want to do.

But you do know what you don’t want to do.

Back when I was doing personal financial planning I knew I was totally bored, resented my clients, and had to do something else before I threw my laptop out the window and torched all my client files.

But I had no idea what I wanted to do with my business.

So I let go of my financial planning license (RIA) and shut down my practice. Giving up almost all my income. Creating space (physical, mental, emotional, spiritual) for the new ideas, opportunities, people, to flow into my life.

This January 2010 I let go of even more stuff. Dropped relaunching a program that I no longer loved. Shut down a website that still gets traffic, but no longer matches where I’m going. Took projects off my launch list for 2010 that were things other people thought I “should” do, but I knew, in my gut, were not me. Letting go of some (theoretically) immediate income & traffic to make room for my truth.

So what’s on your to do list, your goals for this year, your project calendar that no longer matches who you are?

What no longer resonates with where you are going, what you want to be when you grow up?

Dump them. Turn them off. Close the doors. Unfriend. Say no.

Create space for magic. Opportunity. Joy. Projects and people who match your truth.

The only possible way you are going to have the time, energy, and capacity to create something amazing is if you let go of everything that’s just mediocre.

3. Go Write at Starbucks. Jump in a Puddle. Take the Next Plane to Vegas.

I have those days when I’m completely incapable of doing anything. I want to eat an entire bag of double stuffed Oreos and I start fantasizing about how wonderful it would be to be a checkout person at a Safeway grocery store.

When I’m in that mode, nothing is going to happen until I break the pattern.

Change my state. Shake myself up.

So those are the days when I rearrange the furniture in my office. Sit on the floor with my laptop in my lap to write the blog post. Drop everything to go hiking in the woods with my kid. Eat really spicy food at the new Thai restaurant down the street. Drive an hour to the beach to smell the ocean.

Are you feeling totally incapable of doing anything remotely productive?

Maybe you don’t have ideas (or you have too many). You don’t know what to say no to, because everything seems to be equally okay (or equally terrible. or you think you need the money.). You’re completely frozen in murkiness or melancholy or overwhelm or freakoutification.

What do you do?

Get out. Move. Change something. Get yourself stirred up.

Do something that makes you uncomfortable. Something that takes you out of your comfort zone, your regular routine.

If you can’t write at your regular desk, take your laptop to a different coffee shop, one you’ve never been to before. And sit at table totally different than one you would normally choose. Order the opposite of your drink: instead of your double shot grande mocha, order an iced tea or a full-fat frappachino.

Or don’t “work” – get out. Put on your raincoat and go splashing through puddle with your kid. Go to the mall an hour from your house and strike up a conversation with the person sitting on the bench next to you. Take a road trip to the ocean or a mountain or to see the largest ball of string in the county. Schedule a weekend in Vegas or New York City or Hawaii or a cabin in the woods.

If you don’t know what action to take on your business, then just take action, crazy action, in this moment. In being alive. Get moving. Change your state.

And your entire perspective will shift.

Your crap will start to clear away. And the next step, whether it is an action step on your scary inspired project or where it is knowing what you need to say no to — that next step will suddenly emerge as obvious.

Your Live Your Truth & Get Unstuck Action Steps:

1. Take the first little step on the most scary idea you have on your list.
2. Say no to something or someone that you know is not a right fit for where you are going.
3. Get out of your comfort zone and do something weird today.

Elizabeth Potts Weinstein empowers solo multipassionate entrepreneurs to speak & live their truth in their businesses & lives. She’s also a mom, attorney, author, speaker, entrepreneur, video blogging addict, lover of passion, tweetup connoisseur, people loving introvert, and truth evangelist. But here what she’s really about: Elizabeth does crazy sh*t and says the things that everyone thinks and no one says, to empower others to do their crazy sh*t and speak their truth. And … get paid for it. It’s the best freaking gig ever. Find her at http://elizabethpottsweinstein.com or on twitter at http://twitter.com/elizabethpw.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 28th, 2010 at 8:45 am and is filed under 30 Days to Changing Your Game. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.