Fear Can Be Your Friend

As artists fear is a common part of our creative process and business.

Some common fears we have:
thinking our things are not good enough
sharing our story
speaking in public 
reaching out to retail store
seeking wholesale ventures
networking
self promotion

The big thing we fear is having other people judging us personally and creatively, and the really big one, the fear of failure.

An easy way to get past those fears is to know that you are not the only one that feels that way. It is common emotion for most creatives. You just have to take a deep breath and go for it, regardless of the results after making the first step each step after that will get a little easier.

Fear can be your friend.

Use your fears to know that you are learning.  Exploring those new territories, even scary ones, make you more alert to growing and learning.

Fear is also a sign that what you are doing is important. The stuff that is important to you usually has some fear around it, because you care about how it turn out.

When you are in a situation that scares you, accept the fear, take a deep breath, recite a positive affirmation, and go for it!

Fear is part of our process as creative business owners. Don't let it stop you from trying new things and growing your business.

What scares you about growing your business?

Help someone in you social community get past their fear, share this post on your social networks.

Don't Wait for Inspiration

There are times during the creative process when you don't feel inspired, and that is OK.

Sometimes the ideas are not flowing, and we are not inspired to create new pieces over and over again. But there are times when we need to be creating, so it's important to have a list of ideas to help start the ideas flowing.

Here is a list of simple ideas to help you get started:

When you need to be working and the ideas are not flowing, what do you do to get inspired?

Motivation Monday

Take Control of Your Life

We all have restrictions in our lives.

But, equally, we all have vast areas of untested capacity:

to make decisions; to plan our future; to follow our paths.

It's easy to blame others for our inaction.

It's easy to blame our constraints.

Take the initiative.

Take control.

Decide your own journey.

Now Is the Time by Patrick Lindsay

Sleep In

It's the weekend, and for some reason we seem to be as busy on the weekends as we are during our work week.

The best part about the weekend is that we don't have to get up super early to get our day started. There is no reason you can't take a day and sleep in late, hit the snooze button, roll over and take that extra half hour. 

All your errands will wait an extra half hour as you enjoy some quite time to yourself.

I love Saturdays, because it's the one day I wake up and just lay in bed and enjoy the quite while I watch the birds and squirrels play in the trees outside my window. I have gotten some of my best ideas during that quite time in the morning.

Commit to yourself that one morning you are going to sleep in late, to enjoy some relaxing me time.

How often do you sleep in late?

Share Self-Love Saturday with your social community.

How to Ask For What You Want

As working artists, asking people to buy our items is an important part of our business.

We have to ask customers to make a purchase, ask bloggers to feature our work, ask stores to sell our items, and ask for support from friends and family. With so much asking, we have to make sure that when we ask we get the results we want.

There are five ways you can do the asking and get results:

1. Ask Clearly
Be precise. Think clearly about your idea, and take the time to prepare your question or questions. Words are powerful, so you want to choose them carefully. This is important when you are selling online, because you have to ask your customers to buy with the words that you write.

2. Ask with Confidence
Don't hesitate or act uncertain when you are doing your ask. Ask your questions with boldness and confidence. Remember if you don't get the results you want, it's not about how you asked, maybe who you asked is not be the right person. So try again.

3. Ask Consistently
The more you ask the easier it will get, and the better your results will be. If you are trying to get into retail stores, don't give up. If one says no, go to the next store and ask them.

4. Ask Creatively
With so many people asking the same questions, you have to get creative to stand out in the crowd. Brainstorm some fun ideas for getting your customers, bloggers, or retail stores interested in your product.

5. Ask Sincerely
In some cases you may need to be real with people and tell it like it is, flaws and all. This can be challenging especially with family and friends, but you may need to ask for their help and you want to ask from the heart.

Asking for what we want may sound like a simple idea, but in some cases it may be scary, or even challenging. Use these steps to help you get the results you want, because the more you ask the more you will receive.

Do you find it challenging to ask for what you want in your business?

Share this post with your social community.

Motivation Monday

A Simple Idea for Me Time

Some of my best ideas happen when I am out on a walk. Having that time to myself to process ideas and to relax my mind of everyday thoughts is essential to my creative process.

Finding a few minutes to yourself for a quick walk around the block, or an adventure on a nature trail is the perfect way to have some me time.

When you go out for a walk with the idea of having me time and processing ideas, you get to enjoy some time to yourself and you get the added benefit of it being good for you too.

Try taking a walk daily even if it's only for 5 minutes, to clear your mind and enjoy spending time with yourself.

Do you enjoy taking walks?

Share some Self-Love Saturday with your social community.

Finding or Creating a Group that Will Help You Succeed

In the last post I talked about the purpose of a mastermind group, and why you should consider being a part of one. Today you get to decide if you want to join an existing group or start one of your own.

There are many different kinds of mastermind groups, for business owners, managers, artists, crafters, moms, or even weight loss. They may not all be called mastermind groups, but the focus is still the same, for everyone to succeed.

You can easily find a mastermind group to join by asking friends, family, and your peers about groups they belong too. You can check sites like meetup.com, they have several options especially if you want a group you can meet with in person. You can also try Google.com for mastermind groups looking for members.

Be sure you know what you want from a mastermind group before you contact the leader of the group about participating.

Here are a few questions to consider:

Do you want to meet in person or online?
Do you prefer morning or evening meetings?
What topics are important to you?
What do you want to be held accountable for?

Once you have the answers to these questions you are ready to make contact. Talk with the leader and other members of the group to make sure the group is a good match for you.

Joining an existing group may not be what you are looking for, maybe you are ready to start your own.

If that is the case you can easily set up a group with these 5 simple steps.

Pick a niche or topic. The more specific you define your group the easier it will be to find the right group members.

Decide how many people you want in the group. The best groups are between 4 - 8 people. It gives everyone the opportunity to participate in a meeting without the meetings taking all day.

Find the right members. You want people who are ready to make positive changes in their business, have a positive outlook, and ready to receive and give support.

Decide how your group will meet. Do you want it to be a local group where you can all meet in person, or an online group. These days it is easy to have group members from all over, with Skype, Google+ Hangouts, Facebook, and other social media sites.

Decide how often you want to meet. Meeting once or twice a month is best, to keep the ideas flowing and to really hold you accountable in meeting your goals.

Once you have your group in place there is an abundance of information about starting and running a mastermind group online.

Are you interested in being in a mastermind group?

I would like to start a group of online shop owners with a creative business that are looking to have a successful 2014. If that is something you want to be part of, Email me and lets see if we can get something started additionsstyleblog@gmail.com

Mastermind groups are an important part of business, share this post with your social community.