Accomplishment

Doing More Than You’ve Done

Garth Beyer

Of course that’s not possible, but feeling like you’ve done more than you have is.

Shoes tell a lot about a person. I always say that you never have to step in anyone’s shoes to know what their life is like, you’ve just got to look at the bottom of them.

Tried and true… until recently.

I’m wearing my second pair of Steve Madden shoes and I feel bad. I feel like I’ve done more than I actually have. You look at the bottom of my shoes and all traction is worn flat. Oh, and the soles are cracked, creating a hole for my heel to nearly touch the pavement with each step. (They actually did with my last pair!)

Alas, I’ve done very little of anything exciting while wearing these shoes. A few dress-up events here, a few nice dinners there and that’s it. No parkour, no carnivals, or community interactive events. In other words, I’ve done little while wearing these shoes. They seem to reflect the opposite.

Maybe it’s just me. Maybe most people will only think the shoe is poorly made, and it is, but one thing is guaranteed: everything you use makes you feel something.

People love products that make them feel good, make them feel motivated, better-than-average, and like they accomplished something. Whether you think about how you feel when you use something or not, if you’re creating something for someone else to use, you don’t have a choice but to consider it.

 

Stay Positive & How Does That Make You Feel?

Garth E. Beyer

Steps To Comfort

Garth Beyer

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I’m still smirking from when the idea for this post first popped in my mind.  I am far from ever liking the idea of getting comfortable. In fact, I advocate the complete opposite, that you get uncomfortable.

Then I read the following advice,

“Challenge yourself. Take greater and greater risks. Don’t stay in your comfort zone; enjoy the comfort at the end of each step.”

How true is the last statement. It means that when you finally get your cake, make sure to eat it too. Enjoy the accomplishment. Enjoy the new sense of familiarity. Enjoy being comfortable with meeting new goals.

I never thought comfort could be associated with moving forward. Proved me wrong.

 

Stay Positive & “Get Comfortable” Still Feels Weird Saying

Garth E. Beyer

Photo credit

Start Flailing

Garth Beyer

Yesterday I wrote a post about making your 2013 new years resolution list now and trying to complete it by the end of this year.

The day before that, I published my book of poetry Sleeping Above Your Dreams.

Today is the day I encourage you to start flailing, thrashing, pushing, egging, thwacking, and a bit of swaggering to get your goals completed.

So often we wait until the last-minute for things and we flail to get them done. New years sucks because we have this idea that we can just set the goal to finish something next year. We have nothing to really trigger us to flail, no deadline, no one riding our backs.

In fact, everyone is supporting your effort to prolong yours. No one ever says to you, “No. I want to see that finished before the end of this year, not next year. You have better things to move on to and focus on for next year.”

Well. No one has ever said that to you until now.

This month of December has always been the month that the most items have been shipped. Let’s really stretch that list and ship our projects, our ideas, our writings, our muse.

I’m not sure about you, but I’m keeping tally of all the things I ship this year. I have a folder on my computer titled “Projects” and it will be empty by the end of this year. Clear, cleaned out, and ready for new ones to enter it for next year.

 

Stay Positive & What Do You Say To That?

Garth E. Beyer

Shutting Fear Out … In New York

Shutting Fear Out … In New York

Garth Beyer
We may have liberty, but we still have a lizard brain

Who has heard about the lizard brain? No one? Well I’ll have to change that.

The lizard brain is what makes us not do what we say we are going to do. It’s what stops us from checking tasks off our to-do list, it stops us from writing the book we want, stops us from sending that application in, it stops us from living a meaningful, adventurous, exciting life. The lizard brain can also be referred to as the Amygdala, the part of our brain which registers fear. This fear has a voice and it tells us to compromise, to play it safe, to stay where we are comfortable. This reference to the lizard brain was coined by Seth Godin, author, marketer, and revolutionary starter.

During this mass media age, I believe Seth Godin to be one of the most insightful and helpful authors to us digital natives. Seth Godin has written more than 14 books that have all been best sellers and translated into over 30 languages. He writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything. Even if a five-mile wide meteor struck the earth today, you could still say that Seth Godin has made a larger impact on society.

You may think this author is important because you imagine him to be the motivating type. He is no more motivating than a rock. He is however a person who can bring you to understand why you do what you do, rather, why you don’t do what you don’t do. He explains in his most infamous book, Linchpin¸how the closer you get to delivering something, to accomplishment, to taking a risk, the harder the lizard brain works to stop you.  This ability, to make us aware, is what makes Seth Godin so important.

If it’s not clear already, Seth is an idol of mine. Heck, I flew out to New York to see him and wrote about that experience here. Seth has taught me how to build a tribe, inspired me to keep shipping, and has helped me realize the inner workings of my brain and ego in such a simplistic manner. I continue to read his books and build off his ideas and will do my absolute best to get a one-on-one interview with him over the holidays because I am planning a trip to NYC. I truly owe it to Seth for getting me to where I am today. (HT to Seth Godin)

Side note: If anyone has someone they can introduce me to through email/phone/person that either lives in New York or has other contacts in New York, I would greatly appreciate it. I plan on spending the summer in New York to find an opportunity to become more of a writer and to connect with some of the most brilliant minded people. Michelle being one of them, she’s something special! Thank you!

 

Stay Positive & People Help People, Who Help People, Who Help Other People, Who Help More People …

Garth E. Beyer

How To Make A List And The Order To Do It In

Garth Beyer

How To Make A List: Write the list, right now. Write down everything you need to do and ship. Order, size, time, length, color, priority, distance, meaning and result doesn’t matter. You don’t need a list of things to do and not do just to write a list. A list is a list, write it.

The Order To Do It In: Now start doing the things you have written from the top to the bottom. The ones you placed first are the ones that are on your mind the most and the ones you are already focusing more of your energy on. Why take that away to put on something else and have to go back? The first items you put on that list are also the ones that will make you feel the best about completing because they are obviously urgent enough to write down so their achievement will relieve stress, to make you feel peaceful, set and accomplished.

There is no momentum in hopping to different tasks, but there is plenty of momentum in going down a list. Complete what is there and do it fast. It doesn’t matter if it’s ugly, what matters is that it is shipped.

 
Stay Positive & Don’t Worry, Things Will Always Be Added Onto The List

Garth E. Beyer

Getting It Of Your Chest

Garth Beyer

You know that feeling you get when you really have something on your chest? That weight you have held on to for too long by not doing or saying something. And of course, you know that the longer you hold it in, the stronger the pressure on your chest gets. That terrible feeling that continues to build until you can no longer bear it and you choose to finally get whatever it is off your chest.

So you do it. You get it off your chest.

Finally! Now the great sense of relief sets in and you feel free again. You enjoy a huge breathe of air and breathe out all that troubled you. By far it is one of the greatest feelings in the world to get something off your chest.

Well…

Deciding to start doing what you love and acting on your passion is a lot like getting something off your chest except that it is the greatest feeling in the world.

In addition to the feeling of relief, you feel excitement, joyousness, accomplishment, positive stimulation, and success among other phenomenally enlightening feelings.

Stay Positive & What Do You Need To Get Off Your Chest And Out To The World?

Garth E. Beyer

Challenge vs. Goal

Garth Beyer

A challenge is not something you want to do, that is called a goal. What remains unclear is which provides a better feeling of accomplishment. Do you feel stronger and more fulfilled when you finaly reach a goal or when you overcome a challenge?

Maybe the better question to ask yourself: Are you choosing goals that have challenges you must face in order to complete?

Choose goals wisely. In the sense of life logic, the more goals that require you to overcome challenges, the stronger the feeling of fulfillment and accomplishment will be when a goal is reached.

Stay Positive & Remember To Reach

Garth E. Beyer