RobKinney.com

Imagine for a second…

Get out of the way

Rob

There are a number of things that you can do to get out of your own way and become the author you were meant to be. Each of these pieces of advice can help you to focus on positive qualities and banish the negative ones. Each of us at one time or another focus on the wrong things and because of this, our work suffers. As human beings, we have a habit of being our own worst enemy. We allow our minds to tell us lies and we accept in without question. When in reality one of the best pieces of advice for getting out of your own way is to question anything that your mind tries to convince you of.
You need to put aside your fears and work towards your goal of being an author. This is not easy because, coming back to your mind and it’s thoughts, your mind will try to convince you of things that are not always truthful. Your fears are there to protect you but at times, your mind becomes over-protective.
To put aside your fears, you need to look at what those fears actually are. When you take a closer look at your fears and begin to break them down, you begin to see them for what they truly are. You can also see that some of the fears can even be a bit ridiculous.
Working towards your goal of being an author will be a struggle. You will not wake up in the morning and have fame and fortune, receiving a large advance, it just won’t happen. Instead, if you really want this, you will have to push for it. This struggle will improve you as a person, as an author and will improve your craft also. But it will not be easy. It will be a hard road to complete.
Realize that success is a journey not a destination, enjoy the trip. Too many people look at success as one thing which they strive to attain. “If I could only reach this point, then I will have made it.” But the truth is, it doesn’t work this way. Instead, as you reach each point along the way, you will want to strive to reach something further along the path. You will never, ever reach a point where you can put your feet up and say that you are a success. You may have completed things and become a success in what you were trying to accomplish but there is always something else to strive for.
One of the best things you can do is one of the simplest or rather one of the most obvious. If you want to be an author, do the work, sit and write. People want something for nothing. They will want to be an author and they may scratch out a little here and there but then they go out with friends or to do something else and they wonder why they never make it as an author. They fail to do the work and to put in the time. All it takes is a commitment to doing the job. Paying your dues if you will.
When you do sit down to do the work, you don’t need to be perfect. You want to strive for excellence not perfection. There is a BIG difference there. If you are going for perfection, it will never be right and it will never be good enough. It just won’t happen there will always be something wrong with it. What you want to strive for is excellence. With excellence, you do the best you can, you create the best possible and then you send it out into the world.
As you struggle through writing, if you aren’t having fun, you aren’t doing it right. Writing is supposed to be fun, that’s why we write, because we enjoy it. If you aren’t having fun then something is wrong. I’m not saying that the whole thing is a game, you will struggle but for the most part, you shouldn’t hate writing. Along the same lines, if you are bored with what you are writing, your readers will be bored also.
To get started writing or to get through writing or any other obstacle, set a goal or a series of goals. We have been told time and time again to set goals it is what will help us accomplish our tasks and there is a lot of truth there because goals will provide forward motion. As you reach each goal, you will strive a little bit further.
Another important aspect of anything you are working towards is practice, practice, practice. It is only through practice that you will improve. The more you practice, the better your abilities will become. Don’t forget to focus on practicing the basics and reviewing them on occasion. This will help with your foundation.
As you go through your work and even through your life, don’t compare yourself to other people. This is another big mistake that people make. We compare ourselves to others and we tend to think that they made it so easily and that they got to the point where they are at without any work. We think they are so much better than us or were bestowed with so much better skills. The total opposite couldn’t be more true. The real big difference is that they put forth the effort and did the work and stuck with it.
When you are stuck or find the road difficult, don’t forget to take time to think. This can help you in everything that you do and can give you insights in many ways. Thinking can take difficult things and break them down so you can see the individual parts and understand them. You can also see how much your mind can blow things out of proportion.
Also, as you go through the process and work towards your goals, don’t forget to take time to enjoy other things. It doesn’t all have to be about working towards your goals and writing and becoming an author. Take time to live life and enjoy it because that is where you will find inspiration.
What are your best pieces of advice for getting out of your own way?

Speaking, a fate worse than death

Rob

As authors and business owners, we will at some point in time be called upon to speak in front of an audience. Yes, that means that you will be required to take part in one of the most feared activities on earth, Public Speaking!
So many people fear public speaking, so much so that it is even more feared than death. But inevitably, it is one of those fears that we have to face because it is one of the ways that we use to promote ourselves.
There are a number of ways that you can get started as a professional speaker. Mainly, you enter the field either intentionally or unintentionally. Deciding to begin a speaking career, you can start by creating a speech and presenting it locally to different organizations this is usually done for free or at a very low cost, but does not always need to be. The idea behind this is, as you build up you speaking abilities and more people take notice of you, then you become more well-known and are called upon to speak at bigger venues and for more money.
Another way of entering the speaking field is to become known in other ways, for example, create a following on your blog and become well known there. As you gain notoriety amongst your followers, they will want to hear more from you and you will be asked to speak at different events with other bloggers like yourself. Other ways of entering the field or facing your fear are less controllable. You may be called upon to speak or train as part of your nine to five job.
So, you are expected to speak in front of a group, but how can you do it? How do you put aside nerves and get up in front of people? There are many tactics that you can use that may help, such as the old classic of visualizing everyone in their underwear. I have never needed to use a tactic such as that but there is one thing I can suggest that would be the most help in this situation. That is, knowing your subject.
Know your subject as best as you can. Not just your speech itself but the entire topic you are speaking on. This way, if someone asks you a question, you are able to answer it and are not thrown off by the question. In this way, you will appear more knowledgeable on the subject and because you have more information to fall back on, you will be more relaxed.
Another great piece of advice comes from the old joke:
“Someone is asking for directions in New York and they ask, ‘How do you get to Carnegie Hall?’
The response comes back, ‘Practice, practice, practice!’”
That old joke holds true for so many things and speaking in public is one of those things. You must know your speech also and the only way to do that is to practice it. Over and over, continue to practice and time yourself. Also, practice in front of a small audience. Another good place to practice is at a Toastmasters meeting, they are always looking for someone to give a speech.
When you write your speech, don’t make it so dry that you bore everyone, have fun with it. One of the best ways to give a speech is to tell a story or several. Speeches can be a series of stories that are given to illustrate different points and in between you intersperse your facts and the points you’d like to make. You can even act out the different stories or points. One warning is to be careful with jokes. If you are not a natural at telling jokes, be careful! You may even want to avoid them altogether. This is because they may not come across correctly and will create an awkward situation.
You can use professional speaking as a way to promote a business or even book sales. What you speak on can entice your audience to want more, to purchase your product or to simply get your name out there to become known. If your message is a strong one, you may be able to build a lucrative side career promoting your own products. You can use speaking as a way to push people towards your website, blog or email sign up. There are any number of things that you can do to generate traffic for your business.
Running a speaking business is not any more difficult than any other type of business and can at times be easier to run than others. You and your book are the products you are selling. Through marketing, advertising and word of mouth, you create the speaking opportunities.
There are a number of places to get help. The first place to look, especially if you have no speaking experience (and even if you do) is Toastmasters International. Toastmasters is an organization that teaches Leadership and Communication skills. They can help you to learn how to run meetings; how to introduce presenters; and how to speak in front of an audience. The people in any local club are very helpful and supportive. Every club does things a little bit different but they all have the same goal.
As you begin to get settled into speaking and want to find help in building your professional speaking career, another organization to look towards is The National Speaker’s Association. NSA is an organization of professionals who speak. They can help give you direction and support in building your speaking business. You can also watch a number of very talented speakers as they present for your group. But not only do you get to watch them perform, through their presentations, they give you a lot of helpful information for running your business.
There are a number of other resources out there that can help you as you build your career or even find your way on stage. Some of these resources are a number of books, websites and even YouTube. One of the best resources can be TED videos, these will allow you to watch other speakers in action, so you can learn from them.
Whatever the case, speaking is nothing to be afraid of, only something to be enjoyed as you share your knowledge with the world.