9 signs you’re an abstract thinker

Are you an abstract thinker?

And what does that mean, exactly? Does it mean that your thoughts resemble a Picasso?

Ahem. Well, maybe a little. But more on that later….

The truth is that we all utilize both concrete and abstract forms of thought depending on the situation. It’s just that most people naturally gravitate to a dominant, preferred style. And that makes a big difference in how you are in life.

Concrete thinkers are more comfortable in the here and now, with what they can witness and demonstrably prove. They want to know the exact steps and often have little patience with changing plans or new ideas. They don’t like it when they have to try to read between the lines, or when instructions are ambiguous.

Abstract thinkers can’t help but think about how everything relates to the bigger picture. What’s the deeper meaning, what are the trends and patterns, what are the possibilities? They quickly make cross-disciplinary associations and are comfortable with metaphor and subtext. And if they have some basic familiarity with a subject, they'd much rather receive general guidelines than step-by-step instructions. 

So maybe it’s not too far-fetched to say a concrete thinker’s thoughts are more Photorealism while an abstract thinker is more Cubism.

Put another way:

Imagine that a concrete thinker and an abstract thinker both attend a webinar on generating Facebook engagement.

A concrete thinker might focus on the exact tactics that have been proven to work for others.

An abstract thinker might be more interested in what those tactics say about human nature and how the lessons can be applied to all aspects of human interaction within business (and beyond) to motivate, inspire and create connection.

Here’s another example. When people first attend yoga classes, they spend a lot of time focusing on the exact technique for the poses and breathwork. They want to get everything exactly “right.”

Only later will most people start to realize how much the lessons apply to life in general – mindfulness, non-reaction, accepting your limits, and safely challenging your limits. While it’s a great way to exercise the body, yoga poses are first and foremost a way to concretize the more abstract concepts of yogic philosophy.  

Ok. Without further explanation, here are 9 signs that you’re an abstract thinker:

 
1) After hearing a new piece of trivia, you find yourself thinking about how something completely different might be related to what you learned. 

2)  You know those kids that keep asking, “Why?” They’ve got nothing on you. You ignore the eye-rolls and don’t stop questioning until you’re satisfied.

3)  Instruction manuals might be ok the first time, but afterwards you assume that the principles apply to all similar equipment. 

4)  You’re more interested in the intent behind the rules than the letter of the law.

5)  You have trouble remembering precise historic details, but you can talk about the general trends.

6) You spend time thinking about the Big Questions. What’s the meaning of life? What’s the nature of consciousness? Why?

7) If someone wants to motivate you, they’ve got to tell you why it’s important, and not just how to do it.

8) In fact, scratch telling you how to do it. You just want the objective and maybe some minimal guidelines, and you'll do the rest. Step-by-step instructions make you yawn. 

9) You get bored with routine. You tend to look for new ways to do things, and don't mind changing course if it might provide a better outcome.

Both types of thinkers have it easier in some ways than others, and are better suited to certain tasks than others. I’ll talk more about that in the future.

Jenna

In the meantime, is there something in this post that you relate to (or is completely unlike you)? Let me know in the comments, or head over to our Facebook group, Women Taking the Leap, to find others who think similarly.

5 great things your indecision says about you

We’re surrounded by advice to start before we’re ready, push through the fear, and act on ideas quickly. So if you’re feeling uncertain and struggling to make up your mind about what to do next, it’s easy to feel deficient.

(Cue the negative self-talk…)

But when reasonable advice becomes so prolific that you feel surrounded, chances are high that groupthink has come into play. So let’s take a second look.

Maybe your indecision isn’t such a bad thing. Maybe, it’ll serve you really, really well in the long run….

Can’t decide what to do with your life … or even what to do next? Here are 5 ways that it can help you in the long run:

1) At least you recognize that you want change

Sometimes, realization is the most elusive step. But you’re already there. In the words of philosopher Eric Hoffer, “It is the awareness of unfulfilled desires which gives a nation the feeling that it has a mission and a destiny.” The same can be said of individuals. Unlike too many people that you probably know, you have the self-awareness to recognize that something’s not right and the desire to overcome that dissonance.

2) It shows that you’re open to possibilities

If you refrain from choosing an option because you tend to come up with new ideas or your ideas evolve with changing circumstances, you likely have a high level of creativity and openness. And those are two traits absolutely essential to companies that are struggling to innovate and remain relevant. Scientific American describes openness as “the drive for cognitive exploration of inner and outer experience,” and says it is the “personality trait most consistently associated with creativity.”

Besides, your first ideas are usually the most conventional, says Wharton professor Adam Grant in his book Originals: How Nonconformists Move the World. There’s nothing wrong – and a lot right – with stopping to consider the big world of possibilities out there rather than following along with what seems reasonable. Like the discoverers who said, “There might be something there beyond that ocean” despite prevailing wisdom, openness to possibilities is a trait of visionaries.

3) You’re thinking strategically

Even if your hesitancy is due to analysis rather than a constant influx of new ideas, it points to a useful skill: strategic thinking. “If this happens, then that would happen, and then either this or that, and if so then.…” It’s an important survival skill that just happens to be important in business, too.

While the chessboard analogy feels outdated in today’s business environment, strategy and anticipating the future will never go out of style. In the words of hockey star Wayne Gretzky, “A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.” In business (and life), the best players stay ahead of the competition.

4) You want to make informed decisions

There’s an important psychological term called “planning fallacy” which describes is a delusional optimism leading to poor decision making rather than a rational weighing of gains, losses and probabilities. You don’t want that. Information-gathering aids in the decision-making process, period. (Yes, too much information can lead to analysis paralysis, but that doesn’t mean we should throw the baby out with the bathwater.)

When the U.S. military tries to bridge the gap between a complex, ever-changing environment and actionable tactics for moving forward in that environment, they use a process called “operational design.” The key first step in that process? Develop a thorough understanding of all aspects of the surrounding environment.

5) Reflection and introspection are attributes of the gods

Too dramatic? Maybe. Let’s put it this way: experience teaches, but so does “the intentional attempt to synthesize, abstract and articulate the key lessons taught by experience.” (Otherwise known as reflection.) Reflecting on the world around us helps us process and retain information better, leading to better decisions.

Even when people are introspective, turning their gaze inward and reflecting upon their own tendencies, feelings and behaviors, it correlates to better consistency in planning and decision-making and increased business performance.

To tie this up, I’ll explain how this all relates to what I’ve been saying over the last month:

A few weeks ago I shared an impassioned story, imploring you not to wait another minute before acting on your dreams. In the following weeks, I talked about the biggest mindset shift necessary to take that leap. Then this week I thought, “But what about people that don’t quite know what they want to do?”

I deeply and wholeheartedly relate to your pain.

For years I struggled with a burning desire to DO … but little direction. It was heartbreaking. I felt like my life and potential were being wasted, and I hated myself for not being more decisive or having more self-understanding.

Today, my job is to help people in similar circumstances get into action … which is why many act surprised when I point out what’s so great about their indecision.

But hindsight and decades of education are beautiful things, and I’m simply telling you what I wish someone had told me:

The inclination towards indecision is grounded in wonderful traits that can serve you well in the future, so hold your head high.

Now I would really love to hear: What kinds of decisions are you struggling with? Which of the points to you most identify with? Let me know in the comments below.

Here’s to taking just the right amount of time to act,

Jenna

P.S. While it’s fantastic to recognize the positive traits that restrain impulsive decision-making, it goes without saying that your eventual success will require action. If you’re at the point where you’ve spent enough time on analysis and want to move forward, or simply need someone to hash through your ideas with, let’s hop on a call to see if it makes sense for us to work together.

Use this to get unstuck and give perfectionism the boot

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”  

- Ira Glass

What Ira’s describing here – the belief that crappy beginnings will turn into mastery with enough practice and trial+error – is a “growth mindset.”

Embrace it, and you can watch your confidence, perseverance, and learning ability soar. It will even help you cultivate self-acceptance when you’re starting something new, so you can escape the death grip of perfectionism.
 
That’s why it’s usually the very first thing I dive into with my confidence or performance coaching clients.

Unfortunately, the growth mindset has an evil alter ego that you need to watch out for: the “fixed mindset.” And it's much, much more common!

A fixed mindset assumes that if your initial product is crappy, then you’re probably just not very good at that kind of thing. (Sound familiar?) Extra work won’t change reality.

Here’s an example. It doesn’t surprise us that we can 10x our athletic performance and mold our bodies if we sweat it out at the gym long enough with a great personal trainer. 

But as for things like talent or mental performance? Well, most people think they've either got it or they don’t.

Not so fast. It turns out that cognitive performance can be increased. (And according to Ira, so can creative mastery.)
 

Dr. Carol Dweck, the Stanford psychology professor who first coined the terms growth and fixed mindset, found that many underperforming children held the belief that they weren’t smart (or “just weren’t good at math,” as I used to tell myself). 

But when those same children began believing that learning was a process of trial and error where they could always assume they’d get better over time, the children not only scored better on tests but became more motivated to learn. 

Once you start to pay attention to real-life examples of the fixed mindset, you’ll be amazed by how limiting they are … and how they start to sound like excuses:

>>> I couldn’t build a website. I’m a dunce when it comes to technology.

>>> I’d never be able to afford a trip like that! I’m just not a good saver.

>>> I could never write a book. I’m just not disciplined enough.

So next time you’re unsatisfied with your work and tempted to use that as an excuse to stay stuck, give your crappy first efforts some love and remember that they’re what’s getting you closer to the mastery you dream about. Your next tries will be better because of it.
 
(And usually, it’s really not as bad as you think.)
 
Here’s to our incredible ability to choose, change and grow,
Jenna     

P.S. What's one area where you'd love to gain mastery? Get the support and accountability your need at the Uncommon Way Community Facebook group. Go ahead - tell us something you commit to working on ... declaring yourself in public has incredible, lasting power! See you there.

This old website makes me cringe!

As a recovering perfectionist, I know a thing or two about hiding my projects away. 

For most of my life, whenever I looked back on something I'd produced that no longer met my standards, I'd make it - um - disappear. And don't even get me started on all the things that never saw the (public) light of day.

But in the last decade-ish, I've started thinking about things in a different way. And to prove it, I'm sharing my old travel blog with you, Follow Ben and Jenna.

To be honest, I still cringe when I look at the blog. They layout is all crowded, there are broken links, the menus on the mobile site hardly work at all, and some of the writing is ... ahem. (Especially my earliest posts, like this one. "First we went here, and next we went here, and then we went here....")

But now I cringe in the way I do when I see a gawky preteen photo of myself. It makes me laugh and remember how awkward and new everything felt at the time. It makes we wish I could throw my arms around my earlier self and tell her, "Believe me: It's all going to be okay."

Coming to terms with the fact that we all start somewhere, that most of our early work is kinda crappy, but that it's totally okay and expected because that's exactly how we learn and get better, is the single most important thing for an entrepreneur or creative to wrap their head around.

Plus, people tend to be far more understanding than we might fear.

Fail to give perfectionism the boot, and you'll waste A LOT of unnecessary time and subject yourself to much unfortunate self-flagellation.

And next week I'll talk more about how exactly to start doing that.

Here's to giving perfectionism the boot,
Jenna

Why you need clarity now, not later

There's this question I've been thinking a lot about. 

When you look back on your life, will you wish you had done more with it?

The topic is on my mind because I'm spending the last few days with my dad as his life winds to a close. In our home outside of Seattle, which used to be filled with the voices of all of my teenage friends, we're taking some quiet time to reflect. 

Dad spent over 30 years in the same job, not because it was what he should do but because it was what he loved. And now he feels fully content with a life well lived and ready to cross over to the next stage.

And that sense of satisfaction is, in a nutshell, what we should strive for – not tomorrow, but today – because life is so fleeting and so precious.

Not many of us have the fortune of knowing what we want to do early in life or finding a way to make a living with it. But too many of us let that stop us in our tracks.

‘Crash' Nash on a carrier somewhere in the Mediterranean, early 1970s

We settle for something that pays the bills but leaves us feeling empty, and tell ourselves one of three stories to justify the decision:

I don't know what I'm passionate about: I told myself this for years. It turns out that I did know, but I couldn't articulate it, I couldn't envision how to make money from it, and there were several other stories in my head that were blocking me from declaring it.

If you're in this position, run, don't walk, to get some help. Seek out somebody that focuses on clarity, somebody that understands how important it is for you now, rather than later. That's what I did, and it made all the difference. I just wish I had done it decades sooner.

(Regardless of whom you choose, make sure you've put some serious thought into these questions.)
 
I can't make big changes right now. I've got bills to pay / I'm tired / I'm too busy. 

The problem with saying, "I'll get to it tomorrow" is that tomorrow gets here really damn quickly. Big changes start with small baby steps, so you can still take daily consistent action towards a fulfilling vocation without burning the candle at both ends. (I've got a free guide on this subject if you'd like more detail.)* 

To paraphrase the great Stephen Covey, you might have more urgent things to do, but nothing is more important. 

Life is about being, not doing. Ohhh, this one really gets to me. I admire Eastern philosophy as much as the next person, but it's too often distorted by New Agey pop culture.

I've heard people claim that the true measure of a life is in the capacity for love, or how happy you felt, or how well you came to know yourself or God, or how kind you were…

Really?

Because I want more.

Each of those things is valuable and important, but they're just facets of what should be a complex existence. If I focus on just one, I won't be preparing myself to be content on my deathbed.

Because I'll also be asking myself: 

What did I do with my life? 
What did I contribute? 
What did I stand for? 
What did I fight for? 
Who did I help? 
Where did I gain mastery?
What did I create?
 
Because I want it all. I want what Dad had.

He showed me that it's possible, and because of him I never gave up trying to find it for myself. 

If there's any one tribute that I can think to pay him in his death, it's to sing the praises of his fun loving, country boy, find-what-you-love-and-do-it way of living. I hope it inspires you like it inspired me.

Here's to finding what's meaningful and doing it,
Jenna

5 things to focus on in order to find your ideal job or business

Talk about frustration.

Everything you've been working on feels like a big waste of time, but you have no idea what you should be doing next. All you've got is this nagging belief that you should be doing something ... more.

I remember that frustration so well! That's why last week I offered a bit of consolation, and promised I would let you know exactly what to focus on so you could get where you're going as quickly and smoothly as possible.

And here it is:

5 Questions To Help You Find What You're Meant to Do

1) What do you love most about your current and past jobs?

Not what do you like, not what can you tolerate, but what do you love? And more importantly, why?

The answers might not always jump out at you. You might not love troubleshooting all the technical glitches in your company's WordPress website, but you might LOVE the fact that you're getting paid to learn new, marketable skills.

Get in the habit here of taking everything to the next level. WHY do you love writing? What is it, specifically, about teaching that lights you up so much? 

And when you think you've arrived at an answer, ask yourself those same questions all over again. 

2) What do you hate most about your current and past jobs?

Trying to stay positive can be a fantastic practice, but you're cutting out a lot of valuable self knowledge if you don't also let yourself explore the negative. Humans are wired to be not only sensitive but highly responsive to aversion. Often it's easier to figure out what we don't like than what we do like!

As with #1, make sure to ask yourself "Why?" and "What exactly...?" whenever you think you've found something. Go deep.

3) What or who makes you green with envy?

Again, a dark emotion that we don't like to talk or think about, and again, a place where you have to go deep. 

I thank Susan Cain, author of Quiet: The Power of Introverts in A World That Can't Stop Talking for bringing this particular gem to my attention.

4) What makes you curious?

When clarity eludes you, follow your curiosity. What sounds intriguing? What could you happily spend the next year or so learning about and talking about?

Maybe it's a way to shake up your routines and give a fresh perspective, or maybe curiosity is a manifestation of our intuition, that deep sense of knowing that can be so hard to hear at times. (Is that my intuition? Or fear? Or self-deluding fantasy?) Regardless, curiosity is wildly helpful. 

When Elizabeth Gilbert became curious about studying Italian, she had no idea her decision would lead to her international mega-bestseller, Eat, Pray, Love, and catapult her to fame. When Benjamin Franklin decided to prove to himself once and for all the nature of lightning, he wasn't predicting the vast economic windfall of harnessed electricity. But they followed their curiosity anyway.

5) What are you waiting for?

No, I'm not implying that you need to examine your personal psychology of 'playing small.' While that might be a valid question for another time, it can lead to a rabbit hole of self-recrimination that is unnecessary at the moment.

What I mean is that you can start getting familiar with how your future life will feel if you apply what you've discovered now, in your current job, rather than later, in some undetermined future. Because sometimes, even if you've been toning your awareness muscles and going through the hard work of clarifying what makes you tick, you might not yet have a clear direction about your next step. And that's okay.

Putting It All Together

Let's say you answered Question #1 by saying that you really love interacting with customers. And then when you ask yourself why, you realize that what you really love is that breakthrough moment when you help someone come up with a novel solution that they wouldn't have thought up on their own. And then you realize that what you really love about that is being able to stretch your mind creatively. You kind of lose yourself when you're doing it. It could be new ideas, new workarounds, new processes ... you don't really care. You just love coming up with something new.

So, great. Do more of that.

Now that you know something that lights you up, challenge yourself to come up with creative solutions not just with customers, but with coworkers, bosses, subordinates, suppliers, your friends, your dog.... Make it into a game to see if you can spend 20% more of your day doing this thing that you love.

At the same time, you'll be honing a skill that you'll invariably use one day in your dream job or ideal business (it won't be your dream job if it doesn't light you up).

And here's the other great thing: Once your brain understands exactly what you want to focus on, it will help you start recognizing more and more opportunities where you can use that skill.

By the same token, can you do less of what you dislike? Or can you creatively sprinkle in some of that newness / creative thinking that you like, in order to make it more palatable?

If you've found that you're envious of a specific person, only to realize that it's because everybody seems to view her as an authority and take her ideas so seriously, how can you start developing that for yourself? Again, if you envision your dream job / ideal life as a place where people take your ideas seriously, work on cultivating that now.

And curiosity? Just go for it. Download that audio book, join that club, sign up for that Italian course! 

Don't wait, just do it. All of it. You'll be happier, you'll be more self-aware, you'll be improving yourself ... and really, you just never know when that unexpected job listing or business opportunity will come your way.

Here's to the wonderful benefits of knowing yourself,
Jenna

Think your jobs are leading nowhere? Read this.

I get it. Nobody likes to waste their time.

And maybe that's just what your last string of jobs feels like. All of that work for something that just pays the bills, or seemed interesting until it wasn't ... where has it gotten you?

Asking that question is a good thing.

It shows that you sense there's something bigger in store for you. But it can also lead to a lot of pain and frustration when you don't know what that something is.

So I'm going to tell you a story to help ease that pain, and then next week I'll show you exactly what you should be focusing on now so you can get where you're going as quickly as possible.

So there once was this girl...

She started out in retail, selling shoes. She hated it, but loved her employee discount. On a whim she snapped up some completely badass red boots...

Next she worked as an assistant in the design room of a company that made capes, and on a cold day someone offered her a sample to wear home...

Later, working an office job, she won an award at a Halloween party. It was a crown...

Realizing that she really preferred to work outdoors, she ended up on a dude ranch and learned to wield a lasso like nobody's business...

But it still didn't feel like the right fit. She struggled to figure out what to do next until one day she put everything on at once and became ... Wonder Woman.

It never felt like her jobs were teaching her much, or that they'd be connected, but they all formed part of who she became. And yours will have a similar effect on you someday.

Here's to gaining mad skills (and great accessories) with every new thing you do,

Jenna

That time Samsung stole my homepage copy

I could NOT believe this was happening again!

But I heard it with my own ears. My homepage copy, read aloud on national TV during one of the biggest television moments of the year. All the effort, late nights and rewrites ... down the drain?

I'm sure you've been through some version of this yourself - the kind that ends with, "Wait! That was my idea!"

But even though we've all been through it, not everybody reacts the same. I used to react totally differently than I do now. And it's the reaction, not the story, that's worth talking about.

The Samsung Story 

I'm cuddled up on the couch watching the Oscars with my favorite chocolates and my puppy Skye, when YouTube sensation Casey Neistat appears on my screen and begins speaking into the camera. It's a Samsung commercial about out-of-the-box creatives who are doing what they love on a shoestring budget, each in their own way.

There's something familiar about what he's saying.

Well, I tell myself, The Uncommon Way is all about getting your ideas out there, so of course that feels familiar. But for some reason, the hairs at the base of my neck are standing at attention. What's going on?

"When we're told that we can't, we all have the same answer...," Casey pauses for effect.
Suddenly it clicks. "NOOOOO*!!!" I scream, causing poor Skye to jump off the couch in a panic.
I know exactly what his next words will be. I know, because my homepage says the exact same thing. 

"WATCH ME."

Oh no he didn't!
But he did. That was MY tagline, MY message, guaranteed to resonate with my ideal customers...! 
I'd used everything I'd learned during my years creating copy for fashion brands, together with every ounce of creativity and intuition that I could muster.

But now ... I definitely couldn't use it anymore. Now it was just some stale copy from a Samsung commercial.

Those thoughts swirled around my head for, oh, ten-ish minutes. And then I snapped out of it.  Because here's the thing: I've been here before.
Domain names, business concepts, taglines ... I've been through it all.

The Eat, Pray, Love Story

Like the time I told my friend that I was going to quit my job and travel the world, and write a book about it. I had a wedding to attend in Italy, and after that I'd fulfill my dream of studying yoga in India, and of course I'd have to visit Bali....

My friend's expression turned from confusion to pity. "Wait. You haven't heard of Eat, Pray, Love, have you?"

Here's the thing. Back then, I used to let things like this squash my dreams.

I never went on that around-the-world adventure. And there are countless businesses I never launched.

I couldn't bear the thought of following in someone else's footsteps, of being unoriginal. And I definitely never thought I could profit from something that had already been done.

Flipping the Script

This is where a lot of people get tripped up. We fail to recognize that really, there are no new concepts under the sun, only new interpretations.

Even if something exists, OUR VERSION of it will never exist until we risk bringing it into the world. All it takes is the courage - and the humility - to do it.

Here's one of my favorite quotes from Marie Forleo on the subject: "Can you imagine if Bruno Mars said to himself, 'You know what? There're enough sexy guys that can sing and dance. Why even try?'"

Contrary to what we might like to believe, ideas are pretty fluid. 

In fact, Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, wrote a book almost entirely on this subject.

It's called Big Magic, and I wish she had written it earlier so that I could've read it before cancelling my trip of a lifetime.

In it, she argues that ideas are autonomous, longing to be brought into the world, and if you don't act on them immediately they'll move on to another human to get the job done.

My personal belief is that there is such thing as a collective unconscious, and it goes beyond the instincts and archetypes that Carl Jung first suggested. It's where ideas float around waiting for someone that has the balls to make them happen.

That explains why more than one person can be working on the same thing at the same time. Why independent scientists on opposite sides of the globe end up winning the Nobel Prize for the same thing in the same year.

Back to that Samsung thing...

So really, that Samsung thing? It's a great sign, and maybe even a lucky break. Without it, you might not be reading this.

And it proves that I'm on to something. Somebody else agreed with "my" idea, and also thought it would make a splash.

Apparently throughout the world there's a strong, growing desire to look doubt squarely in the eye and simply say: 

WATCH ME.

Here's to flipping your script,
Jenna

P.S. If you're struggling to gin up the courage to make your idea happen, let’s hop on a call to see if it makes sense for us to work together. Get clear on the #1 thing dragging down your confidence and how to break its power over you, so you can stop thinking and start doing.

*Full disclosure: What I really shouted was decidedly more colorful than "no."

I do my best work in bed

It turns out there's a really simple key to success:
Figure out the conditions that enable your best work, and then show up to do it again and again and again.

My happy place is somewhere that I’ve never heard anybody – and I mean anybody – credit as their ideal work environment. But that’s ok, because it works for me.

Before going to sleep, I quickly review my top three priorities for the next day. Then I make sure to get a good, long sleep. During the night, something magical happens.

As soon as I wake up, my brain is firing. (Don’t confuse me with an early morning person ... I'm anything but.)

So I grab my journal off the bedside table and start writing. I get my best ideas down on paper, and then the rest of the day is simple execution and refinement.

There are no limits to where you can do your best work….

My husband does his best thinking while running.

My good friend needs the background hum of her local coffee shop (and the caffeine jolt doesn’t hurt, either).

Some people need to put on a power suit and head over to the shared workspace they’ve rented.

It all comes down to finding what works for you and then carving out that time for yourself repeatedly.

>>Despite the voice in your head telling you that you don’t have time.

>>Despite the fact that you might look weird.

>>Despite the feeling that you’re just not motivated today, and so probably won’t find inspiration.

Just go there. Every day. One day at a time.

(Sometimes that's the very hardest thing to do for creative thinkers that love variety. But do it anyway.)

So I’m dying to know! Where do you find your best ideas? What tends to get in the way of your consistency?

We’re talking about all of this and more with fellow uncommon thinkers in The Uncommon Way Community. Come join us!

Here's to showing up for yourself and your dreams,
Jenna

No, no, no, yes (assuming risk)

If you haven’t figured this out already, I hate to be the bearer of bad news (especially to overachievers).

You will never, ever accomplish everything you want in business.

Group programs, membership sites, live events, retreats, eBooks, list-building challenges, webinars, Facebook, Facebook Live, YouTube Live, Periscope, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, website design refreshers, copy refreshers, autoresponder refreshers…. There are just way too many possibilities for how to spend your limited time.

If you want to move forward, you’re going to have to pick your battles. And that means doing less, not more.

Take the U.S. Army, for instance. It has a codified set of annual training requirements.

But there’s just one problem. If you total them up, it would take more than a year to accomplish everything!

And that’s not even counting the operational requirements of each unit’s particular mission. It’s just training.

Sound familiar? You want to focus on your main business purpose, but there are also a million behind-the-scenes tasks draining your time.

To deal with the paradox, the military uses the term “assuming risk.” It’s the commander’s job to assess the unit’s mission and prioritize the trainings and tasks that will get done each year.

As for the rest, the commander is betting that her unit will be able to accomplish its main mission even without the training and that none of her superiors will question her judgment.

She’s recognizing the risk and taking ownership of her decision because that’s what leaders do.

And that’s what bosses do. It’s what every successful entrepreneur does.     

Remember, saying yes is easy. But in business, your most important skill will be learning to say no.

Ready to put this into action? Stay accountable by commenting below or heading over to The Uncommon Way Community and declaring at least one thing that you will NOT focus on in the near future.

Think about it. Where can you assume risk?

Here's to being a leader,

Jenna