Fear

Take The Stage: 15 Pieces Of Advice For 2015 Success

Take The Stage: 15 Pieces Of Advice For 2015 Success

Garth Beyer

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These are all tried and true practices, insights and advice of the most successful entrepreneurs, designers, brewers, writers, and artists that I’ve spoken to, listened to or seen in 2014.

Absolutely invaluable wisdom.

1) Show the world you’re not afraid.

2) Follow your gut. If it speaks to you, you don’t need confirmation from anyone else.

3) If you can’t find a job, create one. If you can’t find a way, make one.

4) Not everything you do will be a success, there will be things you do that are a flop. That’s okay as long as you push through.

5) Be completely indifferent to what people say about you.

6) Connect things that haven’t been connected; it’s how you make breakthroughs.

7) Wake up early and on your own time.

8) Mornings are the only time that a routine should take place.

9) An overwhelming number of entrepreneurs go through divorces because of their focus on business instead of relationships. Just be aware.

10) Connect with two people a day. Lunch date. Twitter chat. FB message. Good morning email.

11) Go where you’re treated best.

12) Find patterns. It’s the best way to guarantee an idea will work. (You may not understand the benefit of this advice until you start noticing patterns and asking why they are there.)

13) Keep going after something and you’ll get it. Stop and you’ll never.

14) If you make one decision over another because “it doesn’t really matter,” then you’re making the wrong decision because everything matters.

15) Hustle has to be in your legs, not your hands. Don’t get stuck in busy work, do work that matters, that moves you forward.

 

I don’t take these numbered posts lightly. I put a lot of thought and heart into what advice matters and can best serve you. I can chat for 10 minutes on any one of these, so feel free to reach out and make a friend this new year.

 

Stay Positive & Take The Stage This 2015

Protip: you can start right now.

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Your Fears

Garth Beyer

The fears you have right now, the ones you can fully imagine, completely see happening, and are worried are true; the fears that are making you question someone’s true personality; the fears that are making you think of 15 different backup plans; the dialogue you’re constructing in your mind for the conversation you fear may happen; it’s urgent, but it’s not real.

Instead of prepping for the loud, the dangerous, the potential negative outcomes, perhaps…just perhaps take a look at the achievable option you’re ignoring.

 

Stay Positive & Show The Yin Some Yang

Just One Thing I Love About The Web

Garth Beyer

Endless Staircase, Fear

Anything is possible.

From backpacking in an inhabited (by humans) jungle for two weeks to breaking a world record, we can find blogs and YouTube videos to prove they’re possible. Didn’t think a certain web design or mouse contraption could be developed? The Internet tells us otherwise.

It’s a brilliant, but scary thing.

While it shows us the endless possibilities of anything and everything, it also pulls the curtain from which we so often hide behind.

We can’t use “it’s never been done” as an excuse anymore. In fact, we can’t really believe in impossible anymore either. As cliché as it is, the web is proving that if you can imagine it, you can make it happen. Scarily, it reminds us that if we don’t make it happen, someone will.

The world and the web is a scary place. I guess that’s what I love about it.

 

Stay Positive & Run At Fear, Not Away

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Uncomfortable Is Original

Uncomfortable Is Original

Garth Beyer

Banana Comfort, Weird Is Good

Many blogs, many books, many talks are very, very unoriginal. The reason being is they are safe, they are familiar. Ever heard someone say every business book says the same thing, but in a different way? I’ve read enough of them that I would even push back on the “different way” part of the statement. I think all the writing was rushed.

Taking time

It is amazing how well one can write when one takes the time. Think about it. When rushed to write, you use and accept your clichés. Perfect example: journalism. The tight deadlines encourage the use of clichés, of simplification, of uniformity.

When you take time while writing, you find ways to say things better than a cliché can. If you decide to use a cliché, you at least spin it on its head and make it breakdance.

To craft something original…well, it’s scary, it’s uncomfortable, and it takes time.

When you write something original. It’s weird to leave it as it is. You want to change it for fear no one will understand it or like it. It sounds weird in your head reading it over because you’ve never read anything like it before. Orange frizzled daiquiri wedding cake looked sexier than a toucan during mating season. Wasn’t reading that fun? New? An adventure? I wrote it and it feels so weird keeping it.

Alas.

Weird is original and relatable.

The thing about weird I love so much is it will never go out of style. The world will always contain compartmentalists, always produce naysayers, always attract keepers of the status quo — those who are satisfied with the comfort of everything unoriginal. There will always be those resistant to new things and those who fear anything other than what is routine, common, and banal. Yet! There are and always will be those who love and connect with the weird.

Even in light of it all, I still say do what has never been done before. Word the sentence the way you’ve never read anyone word it. If you question whether anyone will like your writing, if you think it’s too far out there, then it’s complete. Ship it. The people who matter in this world (at least who matter to you, to your art) are out there. Wayyy out there. (Think Long Tail)

Build it and they might not come. Build it weird and more will arrive than you ever expected. The freaks shall inherit the earth.

As a dear PR-wonderwoman-friend-of-mine said, “Weird is in. Weird is good. Weird is awesome. Weird is essential. Weird is where the magic is.”

 

Stay Positive & Go Bananas

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p.s. this goes for more than just writing

It’s The Unexpected That Matters

Garth Beyer

You could easily duplicate a comedian’s skit. Memorize all the jokes, mimic all the facial expressions. The thing is, you won’t know how to interact with an audience member who interrupts your skit. What will you say to the guy that hollers out when you only ask for the ladies to say “aww.”

Any act, any entertainment, any art is best showcased when the artist is faced with the unexpected. It can be someone in the audience or one’s own mistake.

The reason why it’s suggested you fail and fail often is how you handle disruption is what matters, what people love to see, what people are fascinated by. It’s easy to follow the expected, it’s much more difficult to follow the unexpected.

Great thing about failure is people will love when you fall and they’ll love when you surprisingly land on your feet.

 

Stay Positive & Put Yourself In The Underdog Position From Time To Time

Riff On The Age Of Independent PR Blogging

Garth Beyer

I just caught Arik’s article on PR daily suggesting the age of independent PR blogging is over.

He suggested there’s too much noise.

I agree, there is, but the most wonderful attribute of the Internet is those who are the loudest do not rank the highest. It is those who provide the most valuable work who rank the highest. There’s a filtration system for independent PR bloggers. Especially PR bloggers.

If you think you’re part of the noise, you’re not creating enough value, you’re not connecting with humans, you’re not standing out. Like I wrote yesterday, it’s not the person who can juggle more balls or yell louder than the rest who gets the attention, it’s those who get in front, those who make themselves vulnerable and those who create the greatest value who get the attention.

It’s easy to say there is too much noise. It’s a whole lot harder to admit you’re part of it. Noise is what groups of mediocre people make. Noise is cared about only by those who are making it.

He suggested early bloggers have moved on.

They have, but we need to clarify, not just the why, but also the where. They haven’t moved on because independent PR blogging doesn’t pay off, they have moved on because it has. They aren’t off somewhere else trying to get the same results they hoped for from blogging, they’re out there reaping what they sowed in their blogs.

He suggested you beware the content machines

Independent travel bloggers, say, Mike Walsh with flight4sight aren’t afraid of sites like Pursuitist. Consumer centric growth blogger Steven P. Dennis isn’t afraid of content machines. Bernadette Jiwa isn’t afraid of sites like Copyblogger.

Just because there are wandering generalities, content machines, if you will, it does not mean you can’t become a meaningful specific. (HT Ziglar)

Courage is the key ingredient

Writing as an independent PR blogger, I’ve shared all the same concerns as Arik. I’ve feared I wouldn’t make it through the noise, I’ve questioned whether it would be worth it or not, I’ve worried what the point would be of investing so much time in a blog if I knew I would eventually leave it behind (I won’t), and I’ve felt beaten by the content machines out there.

Recall the filtration system I mentioned, all the filters are right there. I understand the fear, the apprehension and the concern. It takes a lot of courage to blog about technology when TechCrunch is out there. But it’s that specific courage that makes you and your blog valuable.

If you’re going to plant any seeds, be sure to see their growth all the way through.

Trends don’t end

Lastly, a note about trends in general. A trend isn’t over if people leave. A trend is only over if people leave for something else, something better. Arik notes Danny is leaving the trend of independent PR blogging for his family. It would be different if Danny was leaving the blogosphere to start a new PR trend.

Spending time with family doesn’t produce the same benefits as an independent PR blog. Trends end when people find an action they can take that has the same benefits as what they were doing PLUS some. Better stated, trends don’t end, they change.

 

Stay Positive & It’s The Independent PR Bloggers Who Change Them, The Content Machines Simply Follow Suit

I was privileged to exchange a couple of emails with Arik since posting this. It needs a returning note. There are dozens of benefits to establishing a group blog model, benefits an independent blog model doesn’t have. However, it works the other way around too. My final note is a reminder that you can have the best of both worlds. In the early ages of PR blogging, guest blogging gathered attention for multiple bloggers at once. Think of group blogs as guest blogging on steroids. Bloggers never stopped writing for themselves even though they wrote guest blog posts, why should you if you’re also part of a group blog model?

Thanks, Arik.

The More Different You Get

Garth Beyer

the scarier it gets.

Weekly I sit down and chat with people carrying around bright, innovative minds. They pitch ideas and ask for my feedback. The majority of ideas are similar to ones already in existence. The trouble seems to be in differentiation or finding the hole, the angle, the niche of their idea.

The further away they get in our brainstorming session from what they already know exists (and works! [and is safe!]), the more scared they get and the quicker they dismiss the idea as “not as good of an idea as I thought it was.”

Niches are the creativist’s worst trap. Asking someone how they will differentiate their business is really asking them how much uncertainty and fear they can dance with.

Sometimes I wonder if what you decide to do with your business is not what differentiates you from others, but that you just do something with your business… that is what will differentiate you from others.

 

Stay Positive & Business Isn’t Like Sports, Oddballs Get Picked First