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12a. You have to start before the inspiration flows

Hey everybody, this is Anne. Today I’m going to talk about a recurring theme of procrastination or taking action. I got an opportunity to really experience it this week at Spirit River, when I was beginning my next large scale drawing. My last drawing, it came up on the easel, I had taken a series of photos that inspired me on some level to a topic, and then it seemed to take me over a year to get back to those images. And then once I put the images on the paper initially and got it started, that particular drawing sat on the easel for, I’m going to say a year and a half before I came back to it.

And then, once I came back to it, oh my gosh, it was so incredibly inspired. One segment after the other dictated itself to me as I worked, I almost didn’t have to do anything except pay attention. So here I was, and it was highly successful for me, that drawing. Here I was sitting with a brand new piece of paper, a blank piece, and another idea from a series that I’m making that would spring from the first image. With the first image, it became inspired over time, I didn’t start with the image that I ended with, I started with kind of a blueprint for a composition and an idea.

So to look at the paper and expect to already have the inspiration before I actually got started was just crazy, and I sat there thinking, “How am I going to make as good of a piece as I made already? How am I going to do that?” Finally I realized what happened on the first one was that through working, I became inspired. Through the process of working I became inspired. So I got started, and wouldn’t you know it, after not that long of a time I started to get incredible ideas and images flowing.

So my coaching today to you is, if you’re not sure where it’s going, just get started. Start doing something, and that activity will open up the conduit of your creativity, it will open that, and the next steps will present themselves. So always just take the next step, and the next step for you is to go post a message to me and let me know how you feel about this coaching.

12b. Start freshly open at the beginning of each new project

Hi, this is Anne with part 2, continuing from our last coaching thread, which is Spirit River Coaching 12A, and this is 12B. I spoke about having to get started on a drawing before I could feel the inspiration that would come, and I just wanted to take the opportunity to just relate this to any project that you’re going to work on.

If we’ve just had a success and we’re ready to start an additional project, a next thing, a next chapter, and we’re coming off of the wings of something that we really had success with, sometimes our fear of failure or not succeeding the way we just did – they’re very similar, the fear of failure and the fear of success – sometimes that will stare us right in the face and make us motionless.

And what I’m saying in that last coaching, when I’m relating to my drawing and my artwork, and realizing that my process before started with something basic and it grew with me working on it, me engaging with it, co-creating with it. So what I just want to suggest to you is no matter what, you can apply this to anything. No matter what you’re working on, if you just are staring at it and you’re not getting started, you’re thinking about the end or you’re thinking about what you’ve done before, you’re not in the present moment, that’s going to be a challenge for you.

So I just want to encourage you, whenever you have a project to get going on, to get going. Just get going, take the next step. Whatever you know you’re ready to do, do that. That’s going to open the pathway to the next thing that you know you’re ready to do, and so on.

So today’s part 2 coaching is just taking the idea of sitting in front of a piece of white paper after you’ve succeeded at an incredible drawing, or sitting in front of your next giant fundraiser when you just finished one that was so successful, or your next business, you just finished creating and launching a business, it was really incredible, and you’re wondering what to do next. You’re not thinking about all the processes that you went through in your last, you’re thinking about the end and how it worked out.

So I just want to get you to think through your entire process. If you start comparing yourself to a previous time or event, don’t forget all the things that you did to get to the end of that project or that company, or that idea. You didn’t start with the end, you started with the beginning, and then you allowed yourself to engage and engage and engage and co-create until you got to the end.

So, here’s to starting at the beginning and allowing yourself to be at the beginning, and be freshly there and just get started on the work, and open your being to listening. And ask. Ask out loud for what you’re missing or what you need help with, and then listen for it. Have eyes to see it, ears to hear it, senses to feel it. I’d love to hear from you, throw a comment back to me in an email and say hi. Have a beautiful day.