Author: Garth Beyer

Getting better at something doesn’t need to be as frustrating as we sometimes make it.

Take kindness for example.

It’s difficult to always be kind. In fact, it’s often counterproductive when you try to be more kind. You wind up frustrated with yourself for not being able to do it, you become short-tempered, you give off the vibe opposite of kindness.

The quickest and most painless way to be more kind is to be less unkind.

Gradually recognize moments you’re being unkind and change them. Have the foresight to know when you’re often unkind and go into that setting with a new perspective.

Many write about being 10 percent better.

Why not start being 10 percent less of the bad stuff?

 

Stay Positive & Getting Better Is Easier Than We Think

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If you’ve been published, but want to switch to self-publishing. It doesn’t make sense to stop everything you’re doing. Craft the longest pro/con list. Shut your doors and work three years on writing a book that will be perfect for the self-publish market of readers.

When you have the fans, the admirers, the other writers you write alongside, it’s best to use that momentum and leap.

The easiest way to change your business model, change your way of doing work, change…period, is when you have momentum built up.

Last year was the best time to start building momentum, but the next best time is now.

Start with what you have, what you can accomplish, and build the momentum you’ll need to change your course. If there’s one guarantee about any industry, it’s that it will change and the only way to stay on track is to build and retain all the momentum you can.

 

Stay Positive & To Change Your Course, You Have To Be Going Down One

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The beer geeks of the world care deeply about the glasses they drink out of, not just the shape of them, but that they’re clean. (Bartenders pressing a glass down on a beer glass rinser before putting beer into them wasn’t always the norm.)

How can you tell if a beer glass is clean?

If, as you drink beer from a glass, you see lacing on the inside of the glass, it’s a clean glass.

It amazes me how nicely a nitpicky thing can become a trend and turn into an awareness initiative on social. Take a gander at this write up of #MCCleanPint.

It begs the question: how can you leverage the nitpicky parts of your product or service on social?

If you’re a pizza company do you ask fans to post a photo of the perfect crust done right?

If you’re a crafting brand, how about the nitpicky-ness of sharp scissors. Perhaps call on fans to post a video of their flawless fabric cut?

When all the big things are figured out, we’re left with the little things.

Can you own them before anyone else?

 

Stay Positive & Little Things Will Continue To Matter More And More

A lesson in darts.

Math would tell you the more you throw, the likelier your chances are you’ll score.

The problem is, the harder you try to make hits, the less likely you’ll make hits at all.

Your arm tires. Aim becomes sloppy. Toes go over the line.

The same goes for business.

The solution: aim small.

The right hits matter more than so-so hits and much more than wrong hits.

 

Stay Positive & Aim Small

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The best way to break the rut is to literally break it.

Break that thing you regard with “I’ve always done it this way before.”

Break that piece that’s slowing you down.

Eliminate what you can’t make better so you have a void to fill with something…well, better.

 

Stay Positive & Be Betterable

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A mentor is there to console you. She’s there to keep you facing the right direction. She’s there to remind you of your goal that you may have forgotten overnight. A mentor is there for you to talk things through with. What worked? What didn’t? A mentor, at the end of the day, is your friend. There’s a bit of a fault to that, I believe.

A trainer, on the other hand, she’s there to keep you moving in the right direction. She’s there to remind you of the step you need to take right now. A trainer is there for you to celebrate your wins with and quickly jump on what’s next. A trainer, at the end of the day, may leave you frustrated and exhausted. There’s a bit of glamour to that, I believe.

The problem I’ve seen is people search for a mentor at work and a trainer outside their organization or they flat-out think they need a mentor when they really need a trainer.

Knowing which you need starts with understanding what a mentor does and what a trainer does. Then you’ve got to decide how accountable you want to be held, how fast you want to learn, and how easy the conversations you want to have.

Certainly there’s no harm in having both, it’s actually better you do.

 

Stay Positive & Just Don’t Confuse The Two

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