I once read an interview with an internationally famous author who said he never read the same book twice.  Last week I finished reading a beloved novel for approximately the sixth time in perhaps a dozen years.  It offered up its passages of spiritual wisdom with fresh revelations that inspired and uplifted. 

What books have inspired you as a nurtured entrepreneur?  Whose words have set your mind and heart singing with new ideas and dreams for your creative, work with passion?

Perhaps it is a book on mindfulness that deepens your commitment to conscious entrepreneurship, or an article on marketing that aligns satisfyingly with your spiritual values.  Sometimes even just a part of a sentence or a turn of phrase can fly like an Arrow of Light and illuminate a point in our mind that begins immediately to expand in all directions, taking in – it seems – the whole of the Universe as we know it.

The books that amaze me the most are the ones that I re-read and swear that certain passages couldn’t have been in it the first time around, or the books that you can open to any page and get exactly the inspiration, custom-designed, that you are in need of that very moment.  I’m sure you have some of these on your book shelf.

“How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book. The book exists for us perchance which will explain our miracles and reveal new ones.  The at present un-utterable things we may find somewhere uttered. These same questions that disturb and puzzle and confound us have in their turn occurred to all the wise men; not one has been omitted; and each has answered them according to his ability, by his word, and his life.”

-Henry David Thoreau

Go take a look at your inspirational books.  Is there a favorite you haven’t looked at in a long time that just might be holding some untapped insights or timely wisdom?  Letting your intuition guide you, select one and find out.  Repeats can be sweet.

Until next time …

To work with passion can mean, among other things, (a) to work with devotion, (b) to sustain a deep interest in our work, and sometimes (c) to experience overpowering feelings in our work, for good or ill.  The key to self-nurture is self-awareness and that can be a tall order for any entrepreneur in the thick of all that’s required to get your business to the river, into the downstream flow, and holding steady as you navigate.

If you are pursuing your work with passion AND wanting to stay mindful of your Body and Being in the process, I have some simple gifts you can give yourself that may help:

• A simple tool I use to check in with myself during the day is called a Mindfulness Clock.  Free software places an icon in your task bar.  Mine’s set to chime once at the top of each hour.  When I hear the gong beginning its call, I pause and take a deep inhale, a slow exhale.  In the process, my shoulders relax, my brain shuts off for a moment, my stomach relaxes.  I say “hello” to myself and add a “how-are-you-do-you-need anything” if I want to take the time.  Try this even once and notice how gratefully your body responds.  Your inner nurtured entrepreneur will thank you, too.  Visit the Washington Mindfulness Community to listen to this lovely bell and download the software if interested.

• A simple body movement I use to release unwanted energy is to shake.  Yep.  Think: tremor, shudder, quake.  It’s best if it’s a whole body shake.  Hide in the bathroom if you need privacy!  We take in thousands of emotions a day from experiences big and small that create tension in the body.  Unlike most animals, who do shake off this tension after a fright or trauma or an anticipated attack that never comes, we don’t shake these off.  Does that mean the tension goes away on its own?  No.  It settles into our cells and does not add to our well-being.  So get shaking!  Here’s a worthwhile, humorous article that explains why shaking is so good for us: Shake Away Your Stress and Tension

• Nurtured entrepreneurs are very sensitive to music.  One nurtured entrepreneur I know loves to listen to Mozart when he works.  He says it soothes and stimulates at the same time.  Have you tried setting up a nurturing music station for yourself on Pandora?  If you can’t listen to music while you work, consider taking a music break to listen to just one favorite, uplifting song.  This is one of my favorite nurturing songs, performed by Yo-Yo Ma and Alison Krauss (Simple Gifts):

Until next time …

You’re about to create a scathingly brilliant e-report (or web class, live seminar, event flyer, etc.) based on one of your areas of expertise as a mindful entrepreneur.

• What do you want to teach or communicate?
• What is your purpose or intention in doing so?
• Will it meet the needs of your eager clients?
• How will you know if you’re successful?

Enter the domain of the instructional designer.

What does an instructional designer bring to the table that can serve the small business entrepreneur? This is the question I had to answer for myself when I transitioned from serving corporate clients to serving, with joy, the community of mindful entrepreneurs. My favorite analogy to help others understand the role of the instructional designer is building a house … with no architect.

Let’s say you want a custom-built home.

You’ve gathered pictures of houses and house features you like and you’ve thought about what you don’t like. You believe you have a fairly clear idea of what you want: square footage requirements, number of bedrooms and baths, attached garage, screened porch, and so on. You want to be sure it meets the needs of you and your family. On this, you are the expert.

You describe this dream house to a builder and authorize the builder to order materials and start building. “Call me if you have questions,” you say as you bid the builder farewell.

Whoa! What about the architect?

Where’s the blueprint?

The architect is the bridge between the home owner and the builder, the bridge between your vision and the finished product. The architect collaborates with you to define and fine-tune your wish list, explain the options to you, help you weigh advantages and disadvantages, and translate your vision into a documented plan. When designing a product (or re-vamping one) for your clients, the instructional designer is your architect and bridge.

Can a house be built without a blueprint?

Builders once had that skill; some still do today. And some home owners are themselves architects by profession. The same is true in the world of information and instructional “architects,” some entrepreneurs have the skills to be their own designer. But what I’ve come across in my business most often are these two scenarios:

(1) what they know still leaves room for meaningful improvement and I’ve had them tell me this after I’ve evaluated their products and given them an assessment of recommended changes and enhancements, or

(2) they are working on their project with a graphic artist or a web master who does not have the skill set, but tries to wear the architect/designer hat. Essential elements are invariably omitted and the client’s vision is not adequately communicated.

The Bridge

In designing products or marketing materials for your business, my role is twofold:

• to help you define, document, and bring your vision to life from the user’s point of view, while also
• making sure it is imbued with your energetic essence so that your potential clients can find you because they resonate with what you have to offer and how you offer it.

By using principles of effective design, life coaching, and a mixed-media artist’s eye, my goal is to connect you with your audience in a way that they can hear, comprehend, and use what you have to offer.  And it can be so helpful to have an outside set of eyes and a savvy, knowledgeable collaborator to assist with these activities.

In a future instructional design tips blog, I will present the four key categories of the instructional design process and give you a sampling of the types of questions I typically ask my clients as we begin the building process.

Until next time …

Sometimes moving gently with the ebbs and flows of creative entrepreneurship is challenging.  The time of ebb tides—when clients and/or work fall away, recede, decline.  The time that is so perfect for picking up other work with passion, perhaps a home improvement project or an artistic craft.  But often it is also the time when Ego, standing in only-ankle-deep water, looks at us and says unkind things like,

“Tide’s never coming in again.”

“Guess they don’t really need you.” 

“I don’t think they really like your work.” 

“Uh-oh.  Maybe you should have kept your corporate day job.” 

As small business entrepreneurs, we’ve navigated the sea and shore.  We know these waters.  We know that full tides always follow ebb tides, but still we give at least one ear to that little wheedling voice.

In keeping with my tidal theme, know that now is the time for the blessing of the fleet, YOUR fleet of self-nurturing blessings!  Launch them with deep appreciation.  First, the lead craft, the one whose bell resonates with your own heart the most (for example):

•  People are looking for exactly what I have to offer.  We are naturally and easily drawn together.

Then the rest of the fleet (for example):

•  I choose to feel worthy and deserving.
• I do work I love, and I am well paid for it.
• I am open and receptive to my next steps in life.  I allow new doors to open.
• My support system is strong and loving.

Send them out with flags flying, then sit back and enjoy the view while you watch the tide come in.

Until next time …

“The sailor cannot see the North, but knows the Needle can.”

Emily Dickinson, in a letter to Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1862

As a visionary entrepreneur you have messages and concepts and procedures that you are passionate about and want to convey to your clients.

• How will you make sure they understand and can use what you present? 
• Do you have clear intentions (purpose/goals/objectives) in mind for your offerings? 
• Do you know how to use text, images, audio, and interactions to best support those intentions?

As conveyors of information, we have a choice to be or not to be accountable to our audience for the effectiveness of what we communicate.  This is an idea that has intrigued me since the day I found myself in a college class called Basics of Instructional Design.  With his opening statement, the professor of this class changed my life and career path.

“A teacher can be accountable

for learning taking place.”

At the time I was eagerly pursuing a psychology degree, but then and there became enamored of this field of study called Instructional Design.  I was captivated by the practical, step-by-step methods that could be applied to the design of effective instruction or information.  I wanted to be a part of that accountability, and so I learned how to help teachers/trainers/entrepreneurs design materials/courses/products and services for their students/employees/clients.

I realized later that through taking that class I became a lifelong advocate for the learner, a bridge-builder between experts and their audiences.  This is the heart and underlying foundation of the services I offer through my business, Just You Imagine.  I have found that mindful entrepreneurs are interested not only in what they have to say but in how meaningful and useful it is to those on the receiving end.  It is with pleasure that I now help make the messages of today’s leaders in spiritual and personal growth accessible to their awaiting audiences.

We’ve all experienced excellent teachers and lousy teachers.  What makes the difference?  See if you can answer that from your own experience.  Then think about a recent class, product, or flyer you used in your business.  Was it the best it could be?

Here’s a guide with a sampling of the basic advantages of using instructional design:

Look for more mini-lessons on instructional design in upcoming posts.

Until next time,

A visionary entrepreneur and very creative colleague asked me this week to review her new résumé.  As I began to formulate my suggestions, I became aware of the heightened sense of freedom I often feel in our exchange of ideas.  Later, I took a deeper look at this because:

(a) it’s a state that feels really good, and

(b) I’d love more of it in my creative entrepreneurship.

 As I sifted down to the essence, what I found was TRUST.  First, I had come to know over our long association that she trusted me.  Not just my ideas, but the place from which they came inside me.  And I trusted her to receive them regardless of whether they panned out or not.  Her trust of me, in turn, engendered a deeper trust in myself and my Creative Source.  When this ‘container’ of trust enfolds us, the resulting synergy and energetic exchange is alive and lively.

Then I thought about my clients.  Do we have this container of trust?  Not integrity, because we would not be in a business relationship if that wasn’t part of our initial match up, but our ability to engage with each other in a clear, honest exchange where we tap into the best of ourselves and co-create from a place of trust?  I can see and feel how it has grown and continues to grow with my clients mostly based on time.  Trust takes time to build and it’s connected to many other things like authenticity, flow, inspiration, laughter, good communication, willingness be playful, and believing in and seeing the best in each other.

Trust is a gift we can give if we have it with ourselves and when we’ve been fortunate enough to have someone deeply trust us so we know how it feels.  It takes time to grow trust, but one thing I’ve found is that the more I live in a state of trust with myself and offer trust to others, the more readily we can tap into it and let it flow through our exchanges.

I’d love to hear about your experiences with trust along your entrepreneurial journey.

Until next time,

When I made the decision to move my web site and blog to a more robust version of WordPress the better to keep in touch with my creative entrepreneurial readership (that’s you), I had no idea the number of tasks involved.  I already had the site and blog.  I just wanted to integrate them and give them a new look.  How hard could it be?  Months later, I can tell you that it was a

with a beginning, middle, and end along with all the ups and downs; each day feeling like I should be further along.  Old ideas about getting a thing done as quickly as possible had taken charge.  Was there a deadline after which the sites would blow up and disappear? No.  Could readers still access the old versions of the site and blog to inspire their work with passion?  Yes.

Then I read an essay entitled, ‘At the Pace of What Is Real,’ and came back to my senses, literally.  The author Mark Nepo writes, ‘While this pace may vary, life always seems vacant and diminished when I accelerate beyond my capacity to feel what is before me.’  Letting the remainder of the project unfold at a pace where I could feel, allow, and appreciate both the accomplishments and the delays helped me partner with the project and talented assistants in a way that was more satisfying and downright enjoyable.

The realization that we can do things another way, sometimes a completely different way, can be a big eye opener.  ‘Says who?’ is a question I ask myself when my mind jumps on the runaway train and loses touch with the pace of what is real.  Another good tactic to apply when the mind starts reciting a to-do list, is to add to the end of each statement, ‘Or not.’

E-mail web master and ask about replacing font colors.  Or not.

Find out why the photo on the home page won’t display correctly.  Or not.

Finish product descriptions and proof read.  Or not.

Try it.  You’ll like it.  Or not.

Mindfulness isn’t just for a round of sitting meditation, is it?  It applies to each precious moment of our days.  Being present to what is.  And that requires adopting the pace of what is real, the pace of awareness and appreciation as we go about the work of our hearts.

Until next time …

Yesterday I found out about a project that’s going on in a few libraries in Toronto, Canada that struck me as so brilliant I wanted to share it with you.  It truly embodies the spirit of entrepreneurial thinking!  It’s called the Human Library Project.  Would you like to learn more about a profession, spiritual practice, health condition, or different generation?  You can check out a human being and visit with them in the library.  You can also sign up to be a “human book” to be checked out by other library patrons.

Let’s take little leap here and imagine that you can travel to a library in the future and check out yourself plus 5, 10, or 15 years and find out how things are going with your creative entrepreneurial business.  See if there are any words of wisdom, wild humor, or hugely practical tips you might have for you.  Imagine a beautiful library in some detail, especially the information desk and the person waiting to greet you with a big smile.  Ask for the “you” from a specific year in the future.  The librarian directs you to a numbered alcove on a specific floor of the library where your human book will meet you.  You find the alcove, filled with beautiful light from an amazing window, take one of the two very comfortable seats, and wait with great anticipation…

Okay, dear reader, you take it from here.  Complete this visualization in your next meditation or on your next nature walk.  See how it feels with all of your senses.  See who appears and imagine the conversation.  You might even want to experiment with writing down the dialogue and see what shows up!

Life-transforming ideas have always come to me through books.

-bell hooks

Until next time …

I hope that if you celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday next week, taking a break from your work with passion, that you have a wonderful, self-nurturing time out.  Even if travel is involved, relatives, friends, and lots of activity, I hope you make time to check in and take good care of yourself.

Secondly, I hope that when giving thanks for all the good in our world, in your life and in your creative entrepreneurship, that you also give thanks for yourself.  For wonderful you.  For amazing, supportive, mindful, imperfect, visionary you.  I do.  I give thanks that you’re out there, intent on making the world a better place through your livelihood.

“We can pause all through the day to feel ourselves in time and space…

These little stops bring something of ourselves back to the whole.

The way a bee brings nectar to its hive.

There we can find a new center from which to live.”

Gunilla Norris, Inviting Silence

 

And last, I hope you notice the voices of those you love, the feel of hugs and hands held, the wonder of the natural landscape around you, how good it feels to love and be loved.  And when you behold the food on the table, do remember the farms, gardens, and labor from whence it cometh.

Until next time ,

My creative self comes most fully alive in the autumn season.  I like to imagine autumn’s golden light illuminating and clarifying my fledgling inner visions for my work in the world.  It’s likely that this feeling of joyful expectancy stems in part from happy memories of returning to elementary school with new shoes, new pencils, and the smell of fresh paper ready for another year of learning.  Frodo’s love of an autumnal adventure was an inclination I immediately related to when I first read The Lord of the Rings trilogy.  And the amazing entrepreneurial woman George Eliot and I share a deep, abiding love of autumn:

“Delicious autumn! 

My very soul is wedded to it,

and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth

seeking successive autumns.”

For some, autumn is a sad time as the activity and warmth of summer wanes.  If this is you, Creative One, gather your comforts and remember that the darkness is not to be feared.  Embrace this ebb and take pleasure in planting dream seeds that will add beauty and strength to your entrepreneurship.   By taking our dreams and plans into our hearts for incubation and tending they will be ready to flourish when the next growing cycle returns.

“The leaves, the leaves

are falling down

And goodness, goodness

all around.”

Until next time,

P. S.  Apologies for my long time away.  I took on a corporate training project to support a colleague and friend.  It required full attention longer than I’d hoped.  So glad to be back with you!