Let it be

Hooshing Pooh sticks

Got some VERY good advice from a new client and hope-to-be friend the other day.

She's a professional coach.

There are lots of them out there.  Guess we all need a lot of help.

Mercifully I have met five or six really genuine people who are genuinely good at the gig and completely enthused and professional about their undertaking.  Elvira, Darla, Sara, Angela, Michael, Carole, Grace and others are people who have reinvented themselves in mid-life to realize their real ambitions.

So what was the advice?

"Acknowledge yourself!"

It is incredibly easy for the solopreneur to get down on himself.  (Please allow me to forgo the nonsense of the politically-correct s/he debate!) When business starts to go sideways, as it always and inevitably does, we have only ourselves to blame and for some of us that's when our skills really come to the foreground.  I know in my case that if business slips - as it has done precipitously this year - I am first in line to dump on my efforts to regain momentum and revenue.

It's a real Catch-22 truth be told.

So, what my new friend suggested was this - give yourself some credit for successes achieved and realize that this downturn is not the end of life as we know it.

So, part deux, when Gabriel and Samuel and I were at the lake a few days ago, Sammy decided to hoosh Pooh sticks.  (Read your Winnie the Pooh if this reference is not familiar.)
I thought what a great exercise and something we all need to do from time to time just to collect our thoughts and celebrate even the smallest achievement.  

That stick being hooshed above may be in Niagara or Hamilton by now.  Or, it may be back on the beach here in Oakville just feet from where Sammy set it adrift.  But you know what?

He doesn't give a duck fart 'cause it was fun to set it sailing and so I'm going to start hooshing a few Pooh sticks myself.

Business will improve.  It will require work and focus and discipline and all those other grown-up things we have to do BUT it will also come back because we can acknowledge our success and talent and take comfort in the challenge knowing that inherent talent and stick-to-itiveness will pay off.

At least, that's what I think.