Q3 2020 Review
When I scroll back through the blog I see it was only a few posts ago that I published the quarterly review of Q2, and that, in itself, is an apt metaphor for Q3: the summer months were personally tumultuous and, as such, I struggled both with creativity and being visible in my business. Let’s get into my Q3 2020 review, shall we?
At the beginning of September, I ended my relationship of 7 years. As you can imagine, the months previous to that were dominated by my internal wrestling over what was wrong and what I should do. I don’t want to dwell here on the personal details as there is still so much to do and process emotionally and legally, but it is an important context for the work side of things. In Q3 I had almost zero focus. I was working only a handful of hours a day, doing the bare minimum and copying and pasting rather than innovating.
While I do take August off from posting, this year August began in late July and seeped all the way into September as I found it impossible to, firstly, come up with an idea of anything I wanted to say, and secondly, lift my fingers to type on the blinking blank screen. The lack of focus and creativity also meant that I wasn’t showing up, posting new content or having the shop lights on, so to speak. Which also contributed to September being my lowest income month of the year.
Despite the struggles, I did have a few wins. I created a new Kit, The Customer Kit. It began when I came to the realization that “how do I find my ideal customer?” is always one of the questions I am asked the most. It’s funny, I’ve put off creating this Kit for a long time as I didn’t think I had enough to say about it, but 39 pages later I realised that maybe I did! In marketing our businesses we look to experts and Pinterest boards and podcasts for the answers to our dilemmas, but in my experience the answers always lie with our customer: what they need, love and want. So it’s important we spend time, building a picture of who and where they are, both for their sake and our own.
Another win was that I completed a book proposal, all 18,000 words of it, in August, and have had great feedback from the handful of people who have seen it so far. As part of developing the book, I spent a lot of time immersed in the “how” of my work. I spoke about this more at length in this podcast episode about thought leadership, but in putting together the book proposal I knew I needed to double down on what was unique about my approach in a way I hadn’t done so rigorously before. I had all these strands of fibre that made up the sum of my work, and I needed to braid them together into a stronger whole.
And so, the Inward Attainment Map was born. The IAM is everything I’ve learned, coached and taught about creating a business that feels like you formalised into a cycle and makes it easier to identify where you are and what you need. This means that every time I work with someone or create something new I’m not reinventing the wheel or starting from scratch over and over. The IAM also makes it easier to translate what you’re doing in your business to other areas of your life too. This opens up lots of possibilities around creating freedom and fulfilment in a deeper and. more far-reaching way. I’m excited to see how this continues to unravel and reveal itself to me as it feels like a real milestone in the maturation of my work.
Perhaps it wasn’t fair of me to say I had no creative energy this quarter, because I’ve just spent three paragraphs talking about what I’ve created. The key difference is that it was a very “behind the scenes” kind of creativity. It was nothing that anyone was going to see any time soon so I felt freer, safer, to work on it; as opposed to the blog posts and photos and podcasts which would be going out into the world. I do know why this is though.
One of my core values in business is truthfulness. If I am withholding, ignoring or writing around something, I get that unmistakable “contradicting my values feeling”: discomfort in the pit of my stomach, wanting to withdraw, blankness. I can’t show up with the podcasts and blog posts that are business-y if I’m not being true. I can’t keep up the jazz hands when there’s an elephant crushing me against the wall of the room. So while I was able to work on the proposal and the IAM as a welcome distraction from the inside of my head, I wasn’t able to plaster on a brave face and pretend my world wasn’t crashing down around me.
But now you know. Maybe it explains some things, maybe you didn’t notice :). And now that the world has finished crashing down, and the dust lingers in the air, I feel positive, calm and ready to start building a new version. I know that over the next few months, years even, I’m going to face financial pressures and difficult times, but I also know that I’ll meet them as my strongest, most powerful self.
For the remaining months of 2020, my focus is on building – not drifting. For much of this year, for various reasons, I’ve been like a castaway clinging onto a raft. I’ve been kicking my legs to somewhat direct myself, but have had to give in to the currents to save precious energy. Now I’ve managed to get myself to land, dried myself off, and it’s time to start building a new life. One that was better than before.
