Easy and difficult

Registering for an online class is easy, actually attending is difficult.

Subscribing to a newsletter is easy, actually reading it with regularity is difficult.

Downloading an eBook is easy, actually taking learnings from it is difficult.

Signing up for a free trial is easy, actually implementing the tool in your team’s routine is difficult.

Making an appointment online is easy, actually showing up is difficult.

The point is that we are more and more used to take reactive actions that actually demand a proactive change. In our behaviour, in our schedule, in our focus.

From our point of view, it’s easy to mistake this with busyness and activity. From the content provider’s point of view, it’s easy to mistake this with success.

Us and them need to remember that there is a very limited amount of resources for difficult.

The overall journey

Are you proud of your overall journey, so far?

That is to say, if you look back at some crucial points in your timeline, do you have a narrative to bind them together in a way that makes you proud?

Forget about the latest missteps, the most recent failure, the bad period, the negative feedback, the missed goal. Keep your eyes, instead, on the overall journey.

Are you proud of it?

Personal and personally

There is a thin difference between making it personal and taking it personally.

When you make something personal it’s a sign that you care about it. It means that, whatever the outcome will be, it will along a part of you. It’s about giving a shape to something that would not be the same were you not involved. It’s affirming your identity through your work.

When you take something personally, on the other hand, it’s a sign that you care about you. You are assuming that you are the focus on the conversation, which is perfectly normal to assume, but is often untrue. It’s about taking a part of something that is going on to justify your behaviour. It’s affirming your identity through the work of others.

It’s a thin difference and an important one.

Seeking themselves

Why should people follow you?

Why should they comment on your social media posts, subscribe to your newsletter, download your latest research, share and spread your word?

As a marketer, if you are not constantly asking yourself this, you will not succeed.

Also, if your are answer is, “to become a new lead”, you will not succeed.

People are not out there seeking you. They are out there seeking themselves.

Not possible

It’s not possible is a sentence that should always make you alert.

Certainly, somebody must have said it’s not possible for any of the things we today take for granted. It’s an easy way to safeguard someone’s own experience, to avoid facing possible shortcomings, to retain power.

And challenging it’s not possible does not mean that everything is possible. It just means that you are open to a different world and you are seeking a more thorough explanation about why that should not be achievable.

It’s the way of change.