How to grow your business differently:
Have you ever thought about the idea of mindfulness and how it can help you to learn how to think differently?
Greater Good Magazine’s definition tells us that:
“Mindfulness means maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of our thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surrounding environment, through a gentle, nurturing lens.
When we practice mindfulness, our thoughts tune into what we’re sensing in the present moment rather than rehashing the past or imagining the future.”
Mindfulness means that we are fully aware of where we are. Being in that space allows us to be open to new experiences and sensitive to what’s going on in our environment.
And all of that sounds like a great place to find yourself but most of us live in what we call Mindlessness, which is an automated and habitual way of thinking and doesn’t allow us to be open to a world of uncertainty.
Being mindful changes the way our brain operates and even supports the idea of being attentive and helps you to stay in the moment. One of its most valuable features is that mindfulness boosts our ability to focus on a challenging decision while helping us block out the distractions of those shiny new objects.
The Goal is to Find Your Way
I spend a lot of time talking about finding more time to be creative when I work with my clients. Because when you’re in those mindful moments to experience creativity, it requires you to find your focus while allowing your mind to have the space to wander into reflection and introspection.
Mindfulness takes us into that place allowing the ability to switch easily from one mode of thought processing to the other when needed.
By this point in your small business owner journey, you know that social media marketing will help you reach more customers. You know that it works when you find the time to work it.
You most likely know what marketing steps you need to do and you’ve created some kind of organization system where you keep a list of your daily to-do items. And if you’re like me, you get a small sense of pleasure when you get something done and get to cross that line through it or give it a check to show that it’s completed.
So how do you take those things you’ve been learning throughout your small business journey and fit them into your crazy busy world? I mean done in a way that’s more mindful instead of an automated checklist.
And how is all this going to help you make more money and see true growth in your business?
Look at these steps to help you create new mindful habits to get more done:
Trust me when I tell you that this process works when you really work it.
1. Commit to 30 Days
When you add a new process or idea into your social media marketing plan, commit to do it for at least 30 days.
Think about what it takes to lose weight. You wouldn’t just diet for 2 weeks and say, “OK, I’ve tried this diet thing for 2 weeks. I’ll lose weight now for the rest of the month because I dieted for 14 days.”
It’s the same principle when you add in a new step or process into your weekly schedule. You need to give it some time to find your way into turning this into a habit that you’ll do frequently.
2. Make it Daily
You may not be able to fit all the new things and steps into your day but try to do at least one thing, one item, one part of the program every day.
Trying to do just a couple of steps a few days during the week { or worse, once every couple of weeks } will make it harder for you to get into the practice of doing these new steps and turning them into a habit.
3. Start Simple and Small
Adding to Step #2 – don’t do everything at once. The idea is to break all these ideas down into smaller bites.
To turn these ideas into a habit means that you need to start with something small that you know you can fit into your day. Start doing the simple steps and build from there.
When you see small victories, it will give you the encouragement to keep moving forward.
4. Create Reminder Messages
If you’ve been in business for yourself for more than 6 months, I’m sure that you’ve already noticed that life will find a way to interrupt your progress.
Then we miss a day and don’t get a chance to do the extra step. You know it’s gonna happen so why not prepare for it?
Create little reminder messages for yourself and post them near your workspace. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy like a printout with quotes or images with all the colors of the rainbow.
Honestly, something as simple as a sticky note in your calendar reminding you to do that step or idea you want to implement will work just as easily as anything fancy you’ll find on Pinterest.
5. Stay Consistent
This is usually the toughest one for most people. They think they must work this program every day. And if they do it at the same time, they’ll turn these steps into a habit.
It works great for the first couple of days and then reality steps in – you have a meeting you scheduled weeks before you started the program or your child gets sick and it takes over your focus for that day.
Staying consistent doesn’t mean doing the same thing at the same hour or same minute of every day. It could mean doing your steps always in the morning or right after you come home and your child is doing their homework.
It’s being mindful in the present moment – each moment – to know what works for you.
The time isn’t as important as making sure that you’re doing it in the same place every time. Being in the same place, either in your home or office, will help cue your mind that it’s time to work and these cues will help turn what you’re working on into a habit.
6. Give It A Try
Suspend your judgements about a certain step or part of the process.
That’s mindfulness in practice. Most people will read something and say, “Oh, that’s not me. I can’t do something like that.”
Rather than take that negative mindset, try it out. Even if it’s a smaller version of the idea; before you decide that you can’t add this to your marketing plans – try it.
Sometimes when we take a couple of steps outside our comfort box, we realize it’s not so bad out there. And there’s no better feeling than to accomplish something that we thought we could never do.
7. Realistic Expectations
Understand that this is a learning process and you will be imperfect.
Give yourself a break and know that you’re doing your best; but expect that there will be setbacks along the way.
Don’t expect big changes to happen overnight. Find your own way to create your own process to allow your habits move you towards your personal goals not what someone else is doing.
It’s not about doing everything or trying to be everything for everyone. It’s about finding the balance to create those moments of being mindful that work for you.
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