Tips: Just Let Go

Photo by Toa Heftiba on Unsplash

I notoriously overthink things.

Everything.

Blog posts. Emails. Podcast episodes. Even finding a way to turn Broken Glass Media into a legit business that earns money (instead of me shelling it out to various services).

In grad school I spent days agonizing over how to start a paper, what sources I should use, and what the outline would look like. It wasn’t until two days before the thing was due that I’d finally be able to just research and write it.

After spending close to 11 months writing out monetization plans and the scrapping them, I finally put the pressure on myself to just do it already (looking at the 2018 income statement certainly helped).

Why do this to myself?

Perfection

I’m a perfectionist. I absolutely hate to make mistakes, to fail, or to let something out of my sight that isn’t A+ material. It’s why I spend hours debating the best option, why I use countless sheets of paper to map out ideas until I find the perfect one, and why I can’t send that email or publish that post if I’m not 100% satisfied with it.

Therein lies the problem. Nobody’s perfect.

I tell this to my team all the time but no matter how much I say it out loud to someone else, I never apply it to my own life and business.

I strive for perfection, but that’s not what life is about. It’s about enjoying the ride, doing what you love, and just living.

Failure

I’m also afraid to fail.

What if I launch a course and no one signs up for it? What if I start a membership platform and no one joins?

A failure isn’t a failure, it’s an opportunity to learn, understand, and grow (that’s yet another thing I tell my team and anyone asking me for advice).

So what if no one signs up for my course? I’ll restructure it, re-write the copy, talk it up to my network and to my podcast listeners (because despite my fear that no one would listen, people do!). And if no one signs up for the membership platform, then maybe there’s another way to connect people and offer them the tools and resources that they need.

Letting Go

Starting today, I’m letting go. Writing from the heart, putting my business together, and releasing it to the world. I may not be an expert, but I have my own life experiences to share. It’s not going to be perfect the first go-round. It’ll be rough around the edges, may not be at the right price point, and may not be what someone’s looking for.

That’s okay.

I’ve tried my best and given it my all. And if someone doesn’t like it, someone doesn’t want to sign up for it, then so what?

If you’re out there, worrying about the perfect song, the perfect business-like cover letter, the perfect question to ask that professional you’re trying to network with - just let go and be yourself, let it be yours. Don’t be afraid of imperfections. Don’t be afraid of failures.

Let’s learn from it, grow from it, and move on.