So. The Customerlove for Japan 72-hour fundraiser ended at midnight, and now the Customerlove Challenge begins.
We made a bundle of money ($5,385!) for earthquake/tsunami survivors in Japan. We helped a lot of you get ready to grow your solo businesses with an amazing package of biz-related products. Now, the site has been switched back from the gorgeous temporary design by Lisa Valuyskaya and Rachael Acklin – and barely five hours later, we’re off on another challenge.
What was I thinking?
Well, I wasn’t, actually. You may have noticed I have an impulsive nature. I don’t think things through very far. If it sounds like a great idea, I jump in and figure things out as I go along. And you may have noticed that it seems to be working pretty well for me. That headline up there obviously an exaggeration, but people are starting to notice.
So what’s going on? There’s a secret, and I’m going to share it with you.
But first, let me tell you how I got it wrong – for years.
I’ve blogged a bit about my problems with being what I prefer to call a flake, but the experts like the term Attention Deficit Disorder better. Whatever. Somewhere along the line, I got the idea from the disapproving scowls of teachers, bosses, friends and family that I’d better shape up. So I tried. And failed, most of the time.
Then I was lucky to stumble into one of the few industries where ADD can be an asset: radio. The ‘talent’ as on-air personalities are called, is not expected to behave like a normal person. As long as you show up on time, stay relatively sober, and your audience loves you (i.e., you bring in the money) – it’s all good. And it was.
But I had developed an unconscious habit of trying to hide this Problem That Had No Name at the time. It got to the point where I squelched my impulsive nature almost completely. I didn’t trust my ideas – or myself. That went on a long time, well past the end of my career, until I decided screw it. Nothing was working anyway, might as well try something else. Like letting myself go and seeing what happened.
- The first thing that happened was The Complete Flake (started impulsively on April Fool’s Day exactly one year ago, btw), where I openly admitted my struggles with flakiness. People liked it, but it wasn’t exactly a barn-burner.
- Then Customerlove was born, totally on impulse again, and more people came.
- I got a wild hair that I had to take the Action Studio course, and out of that came a partnership with Jonathan Wondrusch and eventually, the Customerlove Machine eCourse. Jade Craven included both of us in her Problogger post, 40 Bloggers to Watch in 2011.
- The idea for a fundraiser for earthquake/tsunami survivors in Japan came and took over my life and blog for two weeks. And Jade mentioned me once again, in her Thought Leaders section. For someone who studiously avoids writing, it was disconcerting to see myself called a thought leader, but I won’t argue with Jade or she might take me off the page. I kinda like the company there.
What happened?
I started trusting my instincts.
- When people raved about how #customerlove had “rewired” their thinking about business, I knew I was onto something, so I stuck with it instead of my usual habit of losing interest and giving up.
- I decided the logical mission of Customerlove should be to showcase and promote the challengers by featuring their guest posts and interviews.
- I announced a #customerlove tweetchat for challengers to give them a place to interact and grow their networks.
- When I saw how Jonathan Wondrusch handled himself in a few different situations, I knew that I wanted to do business with him. It wasn’t long before we were cooking up the Customerlove Machine.
- And when I asked for volunteers to help with a fundraiser for Japan, a whole slew of amazing people jumped on the opportunity.
None of these ideas were in any of the infoproducts or courses I’ve bought in the last year. There were no lessons teaching these things. They just felt good. I didn’t know they would work out, I just knew I wanted to do them, so I gave myself permission. And then people offered to help.
So that’s the secret: Trust yourself, and then take action.
Pretty simple, really. Oh, and when people offer to help? Say yes.
What have you been holding back because you don’t trust yourself? Tell me in the comments below, and then tell me what one thing you will do today to change that.
Leave a Comment
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
You freaking ROCK. You continue to inspire me to do more and better things.
Thanks for sharing it all here. 🙂
Well, your post yesterday partly inspired this post. So there!
I freaking love reading stories like these. You are incredible LaVonne and I’m so blessed and excited that our paths have crossed, and that you’re up to such great things!
Love you and the customer looooove. 🙂
Aww, Nathalie, that is so wonderful to hear! MWAH!
“here were no lessons teaching these things. They just felt good. I didn’t know they would work out, I just knew I wanted to do them, so I gave myself permission. ”
Yes. Yes. and More Yes. Baby.
Love you and what you do.
P
Love you too, Peggie – let’s ROCK!
You are so a thought leader. What I do is my life. There are all these fancy pants famous people but they don’t make as nearly as much of an impact as you do.
Just sayin’
Well, I got this idea in my head that a thought leader is someone who writes think pieces. That people think about. Thoughtfully. Lots of thinking going on, you know? I’d *like* to do that, but I’m a) too impatient and b) not a deep thinker, in spite of my lifelong dream of magically becoming a genius. Not gonna happen.
But maybe that’s not what a thought leader is. My thought is pretty simple (and naive, I admit): Love is the answer. Can’t help it, I’m a Beatles fan.
I keep thinking that I cannot teach adults. I have the energy of a five year old boy, and I’m animated and speak with passion – this makes me come off as ten years younger than I am.
Today, I taught adults. It went well, some said they would teach what I taught to them to others. Connections were made.
I almost cried on the way home out of relief.
Wow, I wanna be in your class!
LaVonne, you’re such a huge inspiration. I love that the more you trust yourself, the more validation you get from the rest of the world — hooray! You are my HERO!
And oh, geez do I understand the lifelong dream of magically becoming a genius… Meh. Apparently it ain’t gonna happen in my world either. But perhaps if I keep trusting my instincts and bumbling forward I’ll keep getting closer and closer to my true self. Which wouldn’t be a bad consolation prize. 😉
That’s funny, because I think YOU’RE a huge inspiration. You’re an artist, a writer AND a fantastic and funny jazz singer. Bumbling forward seems to work for us, doesn’t it?
LaVonne,
Yay you!
You know how everyone says “Just do what you love, and everything else will fall into place?” Yeah. Me too.
What they don’t tell you is it takes guts to draw your own personal line in the sand and say “This is who I am, and what I do because I love it and I’m good at it.” And harder still to translate that into “Hire me, and pay me what I’m worth.”
I’m so glad you trusted yourself – that’s how we met! I also love this part:
Pretty simple, really. Oh, and when people offer to help? Say yes.
I need to say yes more.
What’s funny is that I couldn’t figure out what I loved until I jumped in and started learning how to swim. Honestly, never in a million years would I have thought I would wind up loving “internet marketing,” lol!
Beautiful, keep being true to yourself LaVonne. I’m so glad our paths crossed 🙂
Kate x
Thank you, Kate. I’m glad our paths crossed too!
Hi LaVonne –
I’ve seen reference in #customerlove in a few places now and have decided to jump in with both feet! I’m getting the hang of e-commerce and want to make sure the standard of service my local customers enjoy is extended on-line. It’s an interesting experience connecting with people, but not actually meeting them IRL.
Hi Nancy! It was so good to hear your voice on the call today – and I’m SO GLAD you’re jumping in with both feet! If you haven’t downloaded the free Customerlove ebook yet, I highly recommend you do so and dip into it here and there to get a feel for what we’re all about. It’s long, so don’t feel you have to read every word, though some people say it’s a pretty good read, lol. You’ll find it at the link above that says, “the ebook.” I hope you’ll also join us in one (or both) of the weekly tweetchats at the #customerlove hashtag on Twitter – here’s a chat room that a lot of people like to use. Sunday chats are set for 11am PDT/2pm EDT/7pm GMT. Tuesday’s chats are at 3pm PDT/6pm EDT/11pm GMT.