Author: Garth Beyer

There’s opportunity to pause, reflect, and rebuild. It’s no different than before the shocker. You framed the situation a certain way before (that was you, not the situation) and you can do it again.

Stay Positive & Chin Up

I took a lot of pictures of different bars, restaurants, and breweries before I opened Garth’s Brew Bar.

I can definitely say that I did not revisit every single photo during the design phase of it.

Which begs the question: was taking the pictures even worth it?

Hopefully your reaction is “obviously.” The act of taking the picture was also the act of processing information, retaining it, letting the imagination play with it.

Same goes for notes we take but never re-read; the simple act of saying “thank you”; and the email we draft but never send.

Stay Positive & Don’t Discount The Value Of The Input

On the side you water it.

Stay Positive & The Watering Can Is In Your Hand

If you know me, you know I love to throw things away. I don’t hang onto much for long, especially if it doesn’t get used within a year.

But scraps… scraps are different.

Scraps are important to hold onto for a few reasons.

The first is that they provide a creative outlet for your brain as you continue on creating something to spec. There’s no constraints to what you can create with the scraps. They are outside the project you’re working on now. It’s all up to your imagination.

The second is that you don’t always need to borrow something from the scrap pile to keep your main project on track, but it will happen at some point. Perhaps it’s just used as a supporting tool and then tossed. Perhaps it’s actually integrated in permanently because the spec was off to begin with. It pays to have scraps around to use when you need to (because you will need to).

The third is fluffy but it’s still real: at the end of the project you get to toss the scraps. It’s like putting a bow on a present. The present is complete but putting a bow on it makes it feel finished.

Stay Positive & Find A Spot To Put The Scraps (You’ll Thank Yourself Later)

It’s pretty damn hard to change a culture or to sell a product into an account or connect with a person until you understand both 1. the way it is around there and 2. why it is the way it is around there.

Once you know that, everything else becomes easier.

Stay Positive & Empathetic

For the sake of this post, let’s assume everything is a game.

The question then is what kind of game?

Is it a finite one or infinite one?

In other words; is it the one we play for the sake of playing or is it one we play to win.

Perhaps there’s nothing wrong with the game…rather there’s something wrong with the kind of game we think we’re playing.

Stay Positive & Pick And Choose

if it’s not one thing; it’s another.

Always.

It’s pointless to complain about it. It’s a law as real as gravity.

Stay Positive & Focus On Moving Forward