Today I feel mentally and physically drained. I went to bed at 3 AM last night. I feel defeated, anxious, and sad about my relationship. I keep asking myself what it means to own a startup, what it means to be in charge. I think what it means is to be able to take a day off if you need to.
Let’s take a look at some of the different areas of my life right now:
STARTUP
I’m disappointed in both the effectiveness and efficiency with customer projects as well as the level of sales outreach.
I feel disconnected from my partner with quite a bit of friction, feeling that there is always a barrier to do what I want to do.
What might be the next steps?
Identify areas my partner is strong in to involve him more on things I need help with
Identify areas I feel strongly I should lead and take more leadership in that area
LIFE
I’m a bit stagnated on my todo list
My life systems for food and exersise are seeing big wins
Huge desire to get more sleep
What might be my next steps?
Fallout during the day only for leveling up people
Netflix and long fallout sessions at night in bed
To do list cleaning/grooming on fridays
COACHING
I’ve stopped completely
Undecided on whether to work on my own art projects or continue coaching
I want to work on my youtube channel and an art group
What might be my next steps?
Finish artist interview challenge
Outreach for potential clients
RELATIONSHIP
I feel misunderstood a lot, mismatching values, too much physical distance
Yesterday I was vlogging a guy \asked me if I was a YouTuber, and he asked me all these questions like what my channel was about and how many subscribers I had.
I felt REALLY self-conscious because I AM a YouTuber, but not a famous or successful one and I feel like I’m disappointing people when I tell them that I have three hundred subs. I realized a few things when I felt the feelings of shame:
People LOVE the idea of youtube, you don’t need to be big for people to be excited about it. Sure some people will judge you but I think most people like the idea that you are trying to succeed and are probably curious enough to look me up and subscribe. In fact, isn’t that what I want? People who are legitimately interested in my journey subscribing to me?
I’m always REALLY self-conscious when people stare at me when I’m vlogging and I always try to solve the problem by either NOT vlogging or trying to ignore the embarrassment. I realized that there is a third better option. Any time I’m feeling embarrassed, I should just feel the feelings until the right path becomes clear to me. Usually, I feel so uncomfortable I will do ANYTHING to avoid the feeling, but I should just embrace it as I should do in any uncomfortable situation.
A few days ago, my coach asked me a powerful question. I don’t remember what it is but I came up with this poem.
the summer sun on the blue pool smell of chlorine, flip flops on the concrete the late nights in your city, lights on long streets big dreams in a small classroom on a paper on the board paint covering the canvases, dripping off the walls life has always been waiting for you to be recklessly, wildly, lovingly creative
This led to me deciding the most powerful question in this whole poem is “why has life always been waiting for you”?
I felt in many ways this is true. I live in a wonderfully creative city. I have a youtube channel, a coaching practice, a well-paying job with lots of free time. Life is waiting on me to make a move.
So I’ve been thinking a lot about, well sales. This video sums it up pretty well.
I have been focusing on a lot of things recently, coaching, youtube, France and my girlfriend and on top of all of that, work and my day job in AI consulting. I recently decided to say fuck it for everything but three things:
My girlfriend and relationship – we don’t have much time together and I want to enjoy it
Exploring France – again not much time, amazing opportunity to relax and explore
Going crazy as an AI Consultant and bringing in a crazy amount of business
My relationship is going pretty good, and for France I don’t want to think about it, I just do whatever I want. So let’s focus on the last thing.
I want to do exactly what Mark Cuban said. I want to be the best-performing salesman at my job. I want to take that experience to build my coaching business. I want to use my success to do consulting like I do coaching and have a lot of fun. I want to use my success to request more pay.
I want to learn how to master content creation. Build a social media presence. Build my connections. Get the reputation and respect that I’ve always felt I deserved.
The main conundrum I’ve been facing is this:
How much information do I give away?
If I give away tons of free information, what are they hiring me for?
If I give away free 30 minute sessions, does that mean I will never talk to them ever again?
After some meditation, I came up with the following thoughts:
I can give away everything
For focusing on their specific problem. The most difficult thing is not to come up with a solution it is to come up with a solution to the right problem (just like coaching)
No, I can always talk to them again. In fact, I can give away unlimited 30-minute sessions. However, it isn’t about the 30 minutes in the session that costs me a lot. It is the 30 minutes of research that I need to do before the call. It is the structure of writing out a plan for them that is costing me more.
I can always have more conversations with less prep or even more 30 minute conversations with them.
In the future, if they pay for consulting, they are paying me to invest more deeply into their solution. That means more research outside of the calls. That means more knowledge of their product and aligning my goals with theirs (just like in coaching).
If I wanted to sell educational products, the cost for me and the added value for them would be in the way I packaged the information. Not the information itself. For example, a special website, platform, a book or an app.
There are three parts of a solving a problem:
Having the knowledge
Transferring it to someone
Using the knowledge to solve the problem
When you create free content, you are mostly some #1 and some #2. I use a lot of my current knowledge + a little research + some production (design, videography, writing).
When I get on random calls with people, it is a little #1 and a little #2. I’m using my current knowledge with no research, and trying my best to transfer it to someone on a call.
When I get on “free” high value calls with people, I’m doing some of #1 and some #2 and a tiny bit of #3. I do a lot of research, use my current knowledge, trying my best to transfer the knowledge, and might even implement a small deliverable (like a roadmap, plan, strategy, or diagnosis).
When I’m doing consulting for them, I’m doing a lot of #1 and a lot of #3 with some #2. I’m doing tons of research, using my own knowledge, leading the charge on actually solving the problem (either building it myself, finding the right solution to buy, or hiring the people needed to build it), and doing a bit of education.
When I’m selling an education solution, I am doing a lot of #1 and a lot of #2. I’m doing tons of research, and spending a lot of effort on transferring the knowledge.
After almost 3 months away from home, I’m finally back and I’m reminded of the life I built here. Peaceful, open, free, and lonely. There are so many possibilities and spaciousness to fill my life with wonderful things.
Today I want to focus my time in building the life that I want to live in the next few months when I will be transitioning to a part time role in my day job in order to spend more time on coaching and building my life up.
Here are some things I want to do:
Unpack
Clean & Tidy
Cut my nails
Look into Gi Doctors
Look into a sleep study
Spend some time with the gf
Cook food
Plan my trip with my brother and sister
Cross off any remaining things on my todo list
Basically, I want to have a clean slate for the next stage of things such as:
Finding a part time gig where I can exercise without hurting myself
Signing back up for jiujitsu
Editing youtube shorts of coaching sessions
Setting up more coaching sessions
Working on sales plays for AI consulting
Researching into buying a house
I went for a morning walk and I wanted to express some appreciation that I gained from my journeys.
Parents House, appreciations for:
Health
Cooking
Playing games with my brother
France, appreciation for:
Walking
Beauty of old buildings
Cuddling
My happiest times in my parent’s house were eating food, and spending time with my brother and parents.
My happiest times in France were spending time with my girlfriend and coming up with crazy schemes.
I was also stressed in both places. In my parent’s house, it was being watched by my parents. In France, I felt very unsafe. Unsafe in stores, on the streets, unsafe in the Airbnb (afraid to break or spill things), unsafe while working (afraid not to be productive).
I think safety is something I want to work on as France is somewhere I would like to feel more at home at.