When it comes to making money from your passions the number one killer of your success is going to be time and giving up.
A lot of lifestyle designers, bloggers and nomads, give all sort of advice, but the one thing I keep hearing over and over again is – don’t give up. And if their is only one ethos you should follow, it should be that.
When I think about the times that I have failed in the past, it because I decided to let things slide until the entire idea came to a stop. I lost focus, motivation and this all my hard work was wasted.
You learn from your mistakes, right? If I was to stop every time something went wrong with my sites, I wouldn’t have gotten very far. In fact, I have stopped blogging on this blog twice before and just let the site sit doing nothing. It kinda hurt.
So what did I do to beat my worst enemy – me?
Firstly, I came up with a number of goals for this blog and the other sites I run. These include RSS subscribers, community (comments, interaction etc.) and visitors,with a target to improve each stat. These goals aren’t set very far into the future. Rather, I usually aim to set only 1 month out. I have found, if I set a goal too far in the future I just forget about it. I put these goals in front of me and remind myself constantly of them…
Don’t rely on your memory, outsource it
The next step in changing my “give in” attitude was to become the number one two user of my own application. The app sends through reminders. I receive more reminders than most other users on the site (i used to be number one lol). These reminders range from the mundane ie. “call janet re: book cover” to the motivational (Buddhist quotes).
A big goal or life change with a very specific deadline is a huge motivator
Finally Iset myself a deadline. This, I believe is the most important factor. I’ll be moving to Thailand in August next year. In order for that to happen I need to focus on and improve a number of sites I run. If I fail im not moving to Thailand. This is a huge motivator for me, and its what keeps me going.
How to keep focus?
photo by – Rickydavid
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Nice post Anthony. I have been backlogging blog posts for my blog before I launch it. I wanted to get 4 per week done, averaging about 2…. I need all the inspiration I can get. Thanks!
Thanks Vinay! I’m currently working on a backlog of posts at the moment…just in case I lose any inspiration for a while.
Hi Anthony,
After blogging for seven months I was getting frustrated and considering chucking it in, but thanks to advice and encouragement from my readers I persevered. Things are growing now and I believe in the power of persevering through the hard times now.
Remember you’re never alone.
Well its a good thing you did keep on blogging! You’ve got a great blog
Anthony, my favorite task reminder-programmer/blogger hybrid,
You’re convincing me to use Task.fm, ever so slowly. Since I think the reminders are a cool idea (plus I’ll be supporting you!), I’ll make the jump to reminding myself using Task.fm.
On to your post…
Setting goals and deadlines is awesome stuff – because they are “headfakes” (for explanation of headfakes, look up the Last Lecture) to make sure we really love what we’re doing. If we really like what we’re doing, you bet that we’re going to muster up all our efforts to crush our goals into dust.
Another thing I use to keep me motivated to blog (besides the fact that I live and breathe being social here on the ‘net and writing posts and all that good stuff) is knowing that “whatever effort I put in now will be returned to me in the future 10-fold”. It’s like the universe aligns in your favor — no kids, not like the Secret — and gives you better returns when you put the effort in. I love reaping the rewards of hard work.
Thanks for stopping by my site and showing me some comment love too, Anthony! I really appreciate it!
Have a fantastic day, my friend!
Brett
Thanks Brett – let me know the email address you use to register with Task.fm (send it to info@task.fm) and I’ll hook you up with a free pro account.
headfakes – I was actually looking for a word like this when writing the post to describe the effect deadlines have, but the best I could come up with was “personal persuasion”, so I left that paragraph out. I’ll be sure to remember it next time.