Blog - Melissa Dinwiddie | Create the Impossible™ | Innovation Keynote Speaker & Consultant

June 16, 2010

Two cool courses: the Empire Building Kit and Question the Rules

Here’s the deal: about four months ago I made a decision to change my life. I wanted to do a better job following my evolving Blisses, and I needed some help.

I found that help in the form of two courses, The Empire Building Kit and Question the Rules. (See my review of the first month of the EBK here, and my review of QTR here.)

I have no business writing this post, because I’m still in work fugue mode and really should be working on my deadlines, but in case you’re interested in changing your life and starting (or growing) a sustainable “lifestyle business,” I wanted to let you know about some special offers that won’t be around for long.

Read on for details…

The Empire Building Kit

What is the Empire Building Kit? The EBK is the brainchild of Chris Guillebeau, owner of the blog The Art of Nonconformity and creator of Unconventional Guides. It’s made up of 15 case studies (some video + transcript; some PDF) of “emperors” who earn $50,000 to $150,000 a year in net income from a “lifestyle business” (everything from dog-walking to art), combined with a behind-the-curtain look at how Chris runs his own business, plus 365 daily emails from Chris with tips, tools, techniques and motivation to keep you on track.

In other words, everything you need to build a meaningful lifestyle business in one year by doing one thing every day.

The Empire Building Kit originally launched for 24 hour only, with a second 24-hour launch a month or so later. Starting today, it’s back on sale, this time permanently.

HOWEVER, if you’ve been thinking about getting it, then today would be an especially good day to do so, because everyone who buys the Empire Building Kit today will also get Chris’s guide, Backyard Biz Profits.

Backyard Biz Profits is a 60+ page guide all about combining online marketing with local businesses. It will go on sale later by itself for at least $50, so it’s a pretty cool deal.

‘Nuff said.

Question the Rules

At around the same time that I got the Empire Building Kit, I bought another course called Question the Rules. The creators of QTR, Johnny B. Truant and Lee Stranahan, did interviews (18 and counting, as they seem to keep adding more) with a slew of really cool people who are doing really cool, unconventional things and making a living at it.

The two of them also recorded 9 additional conversations on such topics as The punk rock, DIY mindset; Setting your real goals; Belief and faith; Networking outside of the box [3 parts]; and The Wrap-Up and the Aftermath)

PLUS, Johnny and Lee recently added a whole slew of Bonus Material, including some more audio recordings (Best of the IttyBiz SpeakEasy; Charlie and Johnny Jam Sessions), some e-Books (Beyond Blogging; 52 Weeks to Awesome; Idea Catalyst), and discounts on a bunch of cool stuff (20% off a Great Bowl o’Fire; 50% off How to Get A-Listers on Speed Dial; 25% off everything Beyond Blogging offers; and possibly some other stuff I’m leaving out because I don’t have time to check).

Basically, you get a lot of shit. I mean stuff.

And it just so happens that QTR is going on sale today through Friday for $200 off (using the discount code qtrftw). So if you’ve been thinking about buying it, now would be a good time.

Who are these courses for?

Anyone who wants to build or grow their own business, especially if you’re interested in doing things in a more unconventional way.

If that idea has no interest for you, and your goal is to climb the corporate ladder, these courses are probably not for you.

Which one should I get?

If you could use some step-by-step guidance, and you’d benefit from a daily reminder to stay on track toward your goals, get the Empire Building Kit.

If you’re just looking for some inspiration, get Question the Rules.

If you’ve got the money, get both. Seriously. I’m glad I did.

And if you get either one, please let me know – I’d love to compare notes!

*Disclosure: If you buy either Empire Building Kit or Question the Rules from any of the links in this post, I’ll get some affiliate income, and will be forever grateful. If you don’t buy at all, or you buy through another link, I’ll never know, so don’t lose sleep over it.

June 15, 2010

Deadlines, work fugues and the importance of not always powering through

Every year I go through what my friend Meredith would refer to as a “work fugue.” In other words, a period of intense deadline stress, when the amount of work I have to do seems physically impossible to accomplish in the amount of time allotted.

Everything unrelated to completing the projects on deadlines gets put on the back burner, and I power through. Forget about spending time on my “Important Work.” Forget about spending time with friends and loved ones. And exercise, sleep and nutrition? Ha!

It is not a period of high quality of life.

In a good year, my work fugue might be a couple of weeks. In some memorably bad years it was 3 months at a stretch, or even more. Whatever the time period, the only thing that keeps me going is knowing that it will eventually come to an end.

I’m in one of these work fugues right now.

In fact, I really have no business writing a blog post. But the irony of the work fugue is that I rebel against it and “steal” time away. And I somehow manage to always get my critical projects done, even though every time I have a work fugue I fear that I won’t.

(I seem to have a supernatural ability to unconsciously know how much time a given project will take me, and push it right to the edge.)

I also had no business taking a break on Saturday night to go to the opera, or on Sunday to have tea with a friend and take a walk by the Bay, or last night to go to a Linchpin Meetup.

But I did.

And you know what? Although it hasn’t helped my stress level to use that precious time on other things than my deadline projects, it’s helped my quality of life, which in turn does help my stress level.

Because I’m slightly adrenalinized due to my anxiety over my deadlines, and probably won’t calm down until I do something that feels like I’m making progress on my urgent projects, I’m going to keep this post short. I just wanted to share that when I’m in a work fugue, doing things that make me happy – spending time with fun and interesting people, going on walks, doing my creative stuff – even just a little bit, actually helps.

There’s only so much powering through a person can do without driving yourself to an early grave.

Periods of imbalance are inevitable (and are perhaps even necessary to live an overall balanced life?) But injecting tiny bits of balance, even when you feel like you “can’t,” can make the difference between suffering through weeks of misery, and living through weeks of tolerable stress.

I’m glad I finally figured this out.

June 14, 2010

Why I’ll never win the lottery

Okay, the short answer is because I (almost) never buy a ticket. Which does, of course, make me slightly less likely to win than if I did (but only slightly).

But that’s not the real reason I’ll never win the lottery.

The real reason has a lot to do with a great post the Seth Godin wrote today. “Entrepreneurial hope,” he writes, “is essential.” But there’s a certain kind of hope that’s more damaging than helpful: the hope of the magic lottery ticket.

I know this hope only too well, and I’ll bet you do too. Who hasn’t fantasized about winning the lottery and never having to work a day in your life again?

It’s that same fantasy hope that Oprah Winfrey will read your book and turn it into a bestseller.

Or that your song will be catapulted onto the top of the music charts.

Or that your amazing performance/product/business will be magically discovered and become an overnight success.

The problem, of course, is not only that such fantasy hopes rarely come true, but also that putting energy into the hope of the magic lottery ticket takes energy away from doing the hard work necessary to create the life you really want, on your own terms.

Take a detour past the gatekeepers

I spent last weekend in Vegas with 100+ other music artists who have figured out that we don’t want a gatekeeper determining our fate. Forget trying to get signed with a label (or getting your artwork shown in a big gallery, or your writing picked up by a major publishing house). Smart artists take the reins of our careers into our own hands.

The thing is, with the right strategy, a musician (or artist/writer/creative) can actually make a better living (and possibly a better quality of life) by finding her audience directly than she would by signing with a label.

(Oh, how many sob stories have I heard about musicians signed with labels? Their biggest goal is frequently to get out of the contract that’s making the label rich at the expense of the artist’s creative freedom. Labels are set up to make the record company rich in the same way that the gallery system is set up to make the gallery owners rich.)

Having your work seen or heard or read by a million people is not the only way to succeed. How about 100 or 1,000 truly dedicated fans, who buy everything you create?

Yeah, it will probably take a helluva lot of hard work, but the sooner you start, the sooner you’ll get there. Waiting for a shortcut in the form of miraculous overnight success will just keep you from doing the important work that’s calling to you.

As Godin writes:

When someone encourages you to avoid the magic lottery, they’re not criticizing your idea nor are they trying to shatter your faith or take away your hope. Instead, they’re pointing out that shortcuts are rarely dependable (or particularly short) and that instead, perhaps, you should follow the longer, more deliberate, less magical path if you truly want to succeed.

If your business or your music or your art or your project is truly worth your energy and your passion, then don’t sell it short by putting its future into a lottery ticket.

What he said.

The pleasure and pride that comes from building it yourself

Which brings me to the real reason why I’ll never win the lottery: I don’t really want to.

Okay, that’s not entirely true. If a pile of money landed in my lap I would certainly not turn it down! I’d be thrilled, to be honest (right now I’d sure love a windfall to pay off my debt!) But my goal is not to lie on a secluded beach sipping exotic drinks for the rest of my life.

I want to create something I’m proud of.

I want to prove to myself that I’m capable of building the kind of success I seek.

Although I’m grateful for help and support whenever it comes my way, I don’t want to be rescued, I want to rescue myself, thank you very much.

And though I have mixed feelings about the whole Law of Attraction thing, I do believe that to a large extent we create our own reality. If my overarching goal in life were to win the lottery, well, perhaps it would happen.

But on the other hand, if my overarching goal is to create my own success, a winning lottery ticket is almost certainly not in the cards.

And I’m okay with that.

Which, if you think about it, is a very good thing.

For another great blog post that touches on this subject, see The myth of the overnight sensation, at the Creative Penn.

June 12, 2010

Weekly Review #10-11: from hating my life to loving it in 4 months

So how am I doing in my quest to re-invent my life, follow my evolving Blisses and create the life I really, really want?

It’s been two weeks, not one, since my last review post. (And if I were Catholic that would sound like I was sitting in a confessional.) Being in Vegas last weekend with no internet access made doing a review pretty much impossible, but I have to admit I’m one person who kinda likes not being constantly accessible.

I want my away time, thank you very much!

(Though given my druthers, I’d take my away time in a quieter and more natural venue than Vegas…)

But back to the question at hand (I do have a tendency to go off on tangents…): How am I doing?

Rather than list all the “what’s going wells” and the “where it get hards” of the past couple of weeks, I’m going to tell a little story.

The Universe whacks me with a 2×4…

Here’s the thing: 4 months ago today, my life hit a major snag. I’d been seriously stressing for a couple of months about money (or more accurately, about the lack thereof). Then two days before Valentine’s Day the man I thought was my life partner, the man with whom I shared my heart and soul, who lived with me and shared my workspace, announced, out of the blue, that he was moving out.

In fact, he’d found an apartment already and was signing the lease on Monday.

Whoa! [cue screeching of brakes and fast-rewind of audiotape sound]

Not only did I have to reshape my entire view of my life, but I also had to immediately make up for the loss of his share of the rent. At a time when my biggest stress was money.

It was not pretty.

…and that 2×4 finally got me to pay attention

The thing is (and of course hindsight is 20-20), I’d been less than 100% satisfied with my life for quite some time.

I was frustrated that I was spending 99% of my time doing uncreative admin and drudge work for my art business, and only 1% (if that) actually creating art. And I’d had some niggling doubts about my relationship as well.

But things weren’t uncomfortable enough for me to make any radical changes.

Face it, things weren’t uncomfortable enough for me to even see outside my little box to envision what else might be possible!

That’s the beautiful thing about the Universe hitting you with a 2×4. Although it feels like it’s coming out of the blue, like my ex’s departure, in fact there are always hints before you get smacked upside the head.

Little whispers, like:

“Melissa, you got into this because you love creating and making art, and you’re not doing that. You know creating is what makes you happy. Don’t you think you should figure out how to spend more time creating?”

“Hey, Melissa, how about trying something new? You don’t actually have to do one thing for the rest of your life.”

“Melissa, this person has really different core values from you. Maybe he’s not the one to spend the rest of your life with.”

But when things are still pretty comfortable, you just don’t always have enough incentive to make a change. It’s hard to change. It’s uncomfortable. For better or worse, even if we know we “ought” to make a change, it’s often only when not changing is more painful than changing that we finally bust out and do it.

As Anais Nin put it,

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

How I’ve blossomed

Susan Elliott has a great book called Getting Past Your Breakup: How to Turn a Devastating Loss into the Best Thing That Ever Happened to You (affiliate link). It has tips and exercises for integrating your loss and moving on with your life, and if you’ve ever gone through a breakup, I highly recommend it.

But the principles behind it apply no matter what the loss is. Steve Jobs gave a great commencement address at Stanford in 2005, detailing how the tragedies in his life turned into the best things that ever happened to him. Watch the video – it’s incredibly inspiring.

(As a calligrapher, I especially love the part about Jobs’ interest in calligraphy leading to the wonderful typography we have today on personal computers!)

Some of the biggest losses in my own life have resulted in some of the greatest gifts:

At 16 I tried out for the cheerleading team (I cringe to admit this), and because I wasn’t one of the popular girls, I didn’t get in. I was devastated, but because I wasn’t booked up with cheerleading time commitments, I started taking dance classes after school, and discovered my first big passion, culminating three years later in a year at Juilliard in New York.
At age 20, while at Juilliard, my budding dance career was suddenly ended by an injury. Which took years to emotionally recover from, but also ultimately led me back to finish my degree at UC Berkeley where I met my first big love.
This first big love turned into a lousy marriage and ended in divorce, but my 5 years in that lousy marriage allowed me time and freedom to explore my creativity and get started in my art career.

And more recently, my financial crisis and my breakup forced me to finally look outside my ketubah artist box. I started writing. I started making art for me again. I started looking at really fun, cool ways to add to my income stream.

I started having fun and really loving my life again!

I thought I was happy before, but perhaps before a snake sheds its skin it feels pretty good and shiny too.

Back to the point

Which brings me back to the point of this post: how’m I doing?

I could complain that I’m underslept and that my finances are still not where I want them to be, and this would all be true. But the fact is, despite the bags under my eyes, I feel more balanced and happier than I’ve ever been.

Why? It’s pretty simple, really:

I’m doing the things that make me happy.
I’m engaged and excited about the projects I’ve taken on.
I’m making time for exercise, friends, and even two upcoming music camps.

Over the course of the last four months I’ve figured out a few things about what leads to happiness, at least for me. And the key has turned out to be totally opposite from what I’d thought. (But this post has already gotten kinda long, so I’ll save that for another time and make it a post of its own.)

Comments from the peanut gallery?

June 11, 2010

Behind the curtain: an object lesson in the deceptiveness of appearances

Today I had a lunch date with an old friend I’ll call M, whom I hadn’t seen in ages. When we met a dozen years ago, M was just starting up a new business. I remember seeing the sketches of the business card designs. I heard the progress reports and watched in admiration as M’s business grew.

I was at the tail end of my marriage at this point, though I didn’t know it yet. With no real earning power (at least none that I was aware of), I felt trapped and powerless, so I envied and admired M’s business success.

I went to M’s wedding, M’s 40th birthday party, and watched with a certain amount of wistfulness as M and spouse bought a house and had kids, while I licked my wounds after my divorce and struck out on my own.

All the while M’s business seemed to be going great gangbusters. M seemed to have figured out a trick that eluded me: how to create and run a business that makes real money.

Behind the curtain

Cut to a dozen years later. We’ve been in touch only sporadically during this time, so when I saw M at the farmer’s market the other day I was astonished at how big the kids had grown, and even more surprised to learn that M had sold the business to be a stay-at-home parent.

Things must be going swimmingly! Good for M! We made a date to catch up over lunch.

Over a bunless turkey burger and a chicken salad I shared my tale of woe and radical transformation over the past four months: money crisis, debt, abandoning boyfriend, but now on a truer path and feeling happier and more in love with my life than ever!

Then M shared a story that took me by surprise. Turns out things were not as hunky-dory as they seemed from the outside: debt, debt, more debt, and a nasty lawsuit by a vengeful former employee leading to yet more debt, and finally, only recently, bankruptcy.

M had sold the business not because it was so successful, but because it was drowning in debt.

Huh.

I was only the second person that M had told about the bankruptcy, probably because my openness about my own debt created enough safety. The sense of relief to be done with the debt was palpable; indeed, I felt relieved for M!

I thought of the other people I know who’ve filed bankruptcy, and others who’ve come close. I thought about how cruel this economy has been to so many, and how my own situation is totally dependent on everything going well. One bit of bad luck, and wham, I could be next in line at the bankruptcy office.

But mostly I thought about how deceptive my perceptions had been. You never actually know what’s going on behind the curtain. That person who seems golden on the outside may have struggles you can’t even imagine on the inside.

I love love love my life, but it’s got its challenges. I’ve got deadlines up the wazoo but am still just climbing a mountain of debt; the fluffs of shed kitty fur are piling up on the floor while dishes pile up in the sink; I never get enough sleep… Honestly, there’s so much on my plate that sometimes it feels like I’m holding on by my fingernails. Today’s lunch was a good reminder that despite how it looks to me sometimes, I’m actually not the only one who struggles.

I certainly don’t wish bad luck on anyone, and I’m sad M had to go through such an awful experience. But I’m grateful, too, for the comforting reminder that I’m not alone.

Life is complicated and hard, and it’s so easy to assume that everyone else is doing it so much better. Some of my blog heroes (Dave Navarro? Naomi from Itty Biz? Johnny B. Truant?) had a conversation recently (on Twitter? damn my Swiss cheese memory!) about how your heroes are just as f-cked up as you are.

You know, it’s actually kind of a relief.