I have a friend whose childhood centered around ballet. 

Dancing was her whole life. And she thought it would be her whole career, too, until she sustained a serious ankle injury during college that ultimately ruined her chances of dancing professionally. 

Naturally, she was crushed. As any artist would be. Can you imagine the agony of realizing that you can no longer do what you thought you were put on this earth to do? My stomach drops just thinking about that. 

But here’s the interesting part of the story. At one point during my friend’s ankle surgery, she received a flash of creative inspiration. A moment of conception. A single spark of life that screamed to her, wait, something wants to be built here. 

Reagan got the idea to start a her own publishing company. To leverage her painting skills and launch a line of ballet themed greeting cards, and to market those cards to the various dance studios with whom she had built relationships during her years as a performer. 

That’s one hell of a pirouette. 

Reagan may not be dancing in the way that she used to, but she’s still employing her talents and contributing to the industry she loves. 

Proving, that just because you’re physically done doing that which defined you as an artist, doesn’t mean you have to creatively leave behind the world that you know so well. 

Life has a way of coming full circle. Sometimes there’s a side door into the same room, beckoning us to walk through. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

How might your talents reincarnate during the next phase of your artistic career?

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Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

The first thing I do every day of my
life is a twenty minute journaling exercise. 

I vomit out every single thought
and feeling and idea that’s running through my racing brain. Dreams, worries,
fears, annoyances, ideas, people who annoyed me the day before, everything. I
continue writing until I’ve filled up three pages. 

And then, about twenty minutes into the exercise, I take the most
important step. I delete the document. It’s gone. Forever. Nobody will ever see
that morning’s thoughts ever again. Including me. 

This is a terrifying
proposition for most creative people. The prospect of throwing away your most
vulnerable and honest thoughts and ideas, it just seems wasteful. So cruel. As
if the act of creating wasn’t already hard enough. 

But in my experience,
deleting my daily journal entries has been a valuable practice for several
reasons. First, it allows me to write off the record. To create without the
burden of evidence. This builds a liberating container of safety and privacy
around my thoughts. 

Second, it allows me to practice trusting myself. To create
without the fear of losing any of my ideas. This strengthens my muscle of trust
and reminds me that the forest will always provide. 

Third, it allows to indulge
in letting go. To create despite the ephemeral, impermanence of life. This
teaches me not to cling too tightly to any one idea. 

I challenge you to try
this exercise. See if you can spend twenty minutes creating something, only to
destroy it the moment you’re done. 

It’s hard, but it’s also humbling and
healthy.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

When was the last time you created without the burden of evidence?

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* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

I recently read a story about a collegiate sprinter who made a crucial mistake during his race. While competing in the men’s steeplechase event, he raised his arm to celebrate his victory as he led the trailing runners towards the finish line. 

Unfortunately, his celebrations slowed him down enough for a competing runner to catch him and win the race. He lost by one tenth of a second. 

It’s a classic story of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. An ironic reminder that when we celebrate too soon, there can be little sympathy for our deserved misfortune. 

Goleman’s psychology research explains that this tendency to sabotage one’s own success is of the most paradoxical of human behaviors. He writes of the intricate gamesmanship that involves accepting blame or a loss in order to avoid the risk of a setback that seems even more threatening. 

That’s why people tend to use the plot of self defeat just at the moment when they have gained a triumph that. Because deep down, they believe they do not deserve it. The sabotage any improvements in order to preserve their defeat and their victim identity. 

The other reason, of course, is complacency. Shooting ourselves in the foot by declaring victory too early. Preemptively waving the mission accomplished banner before the war is over. 

Call it instant karma, call it creative resistance, call it the observer effect, but the underlying principle is still the same. 

Stay in the moment. Keep your head down until the race is over. The time to celebrate will come later. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

How might you be sabotaging your own success?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…

For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

Shakespeare famously said that one man’s tragedy is another man’s comedy. 

And yet, when sad things happen in the world, our response shouldn’t always be to laugh, but to internalize. To check ourselves. To get out of judgment mode and take this moment of introspection to create some positive movement in the development of our own character. 

One technique I find helpful is responding to external tragic moments with internal wonderment questions. When I see a person being victimized, I ask myself, wow, I wonder if there is anyone in my life that I treat this way? 

When I hear about the dissolving of a relationship, I think to myself, man, I wonder how I could to be a better friend to people I love? 

When I witness catastrophe and death and loss, I remind myself, yikes, how can I use this as a bell of awareness to bring me back to center and live every moment? 

When I notice a behavior that offends or bothers me, I say to myself, geez, how I can train myself to act differently than that in the future? 

And it’s nothing personal against comedy. I’m the first person in any situation to find the humor buried within. But once the laughter die downs, it’s important to also use misfortune as an invitation for personal growth. 

That way, one man’s tragedy is another man’s progress. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

What questions do you ask yourself when the shit hits the fan?

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For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

Every business has a handful of dream clients. Ideal
candidates they’d love to do work for. People they’d give their left arm to
collaborate with. Sometimes sales departments will even write a persona or tape
a hot list the wall or compile a vision board or even write a full blown
strategy for ultimately securing their so called whales. 

But more often than
not, most businesses just sit back with the fingers crossed and wait for the
phone to ring. They don’t consider their own credibility as vendors. 

I once read
a fascinating article in a business journal that interviewed
local cutting edge advertising agencies and asked them to reveal which account
they’d most love to land. Their answers ranged from a billion dollar corporate
behemoths to charitable organizations to national sports teams. 

But what’s
interesting is, none of the account managers addressed the crucial issue of
their own brand. They waxed poetic about the benefits of working with their
dream client and how valuable it would be to add them to their company’s
roster, but none of them made a strong case for why their dream clients would
feel it’s impressive to be partnering with them. 

It’s like the nerdy kid
explaining to the beautiful cheerleader why taking her to prom would improve his
reputation at school. 

When the reality is, the cheerleader can have any guy she
wants. There has to be something in it for her. 

And so, in business, there’s
nothing wrong with imagining your dream client. But a more valuable exercise
would be figuring out what you have to become to invert the credibility
equation. 

Positioning your brand in a way that companies are honored and
excited to earn their way onto your
list. 

Doing work that encourages clients to brag to their friends about working
with you. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

Are you target marketing or making the market target you?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…

For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

When there’s something in your life that’s siphoning your vitality, making it hard to keep your fire burning, getting in the way of your efforts to live the best life you possibly can, that thing has to be exorcised. 

Plain and simple. Otherwise it will drag behind you like an anchor. And if you don’t leave now, you won’t leave with yourself. 

Over the years I’ve been in relationships, lived in cities, worked at companies, served on boards, belonged to communities and worked with clients that I knew I had to walk away from. They simply weren’t allowing me to be the best version of myself. 

And it was never an easy task. Feelings of sadness and failure and emptiness and guilt couldn’t help but flood my system. But the encouraging part was, no matter how sad it was say goodbye, I could always see life waiting for me on the other side. And I couldn’t wait to open the doors and step out into the daylight once again, reconnecting with the version of myself that had been obscured by the darkness. 

Thoreau famously said, I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. 

In many cases, then, perhaps elevation is a process of elimination. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

Who or what in your life is sprinkling water, not adding wood, to your internal fire?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…

For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

The creative process is twenty percent
magical, eighty percent mechanical. 

The necessary ingredients of progress are
consistency and focus and commitment and grit. 

Inspiration is helpful, but it’s
not a predictable construct. And that’s okay. Because once a creator starts
humbling himself as blue collar, middle class, job holding, clock punching,
hardhat wearing, factory working, manual laboring, elbow greasing, wage
earning, bread winning, rank and file, mercenary for hire, inspiration is
neither here nor there. 

Producing is just something they do. Every day. Those
are jobs done by doers, not describers. 

Here’s another way to think about it. 

Have you ever
heard about farmer’s block? Neither have they. Because if ranchers don’t tend
to their crops and animals and land every day, there is no harvest. Period.
They don’t have the luxury of even thinking about resistance to
production. They just go to work. Every day. And they trust that the forest
will provide. 

What’s more, they don’t have the arrogance to sit around
complaining about the lack of rainwater with the neighbor farmers. That
actually works in reverse. In fact, if you listen closely, there’s an
inverse relationship between the number of words spoken about a project and
time it takes to execute. 

People who shut up, ship.

I was listening to an interview with a
legendary radio broadcaster, who ranted about writers that protesteth too much
about their own work. His advice was simple. 

Stop advertising. Just do it and
don’t tell the goddamn world about it.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

What percentage
of your time is talking versus tilling?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…

For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!

All open mic nights are the same. 

Show up early, put your name on the list, get a drink, pretend to care about other people’s art for two hours, get up on stage, fumble around with a crappy sound system for five minutes, do your allotted time for seven minutes, thank the audience for judging you, pray that people come up to you after the set say hello, get another drink, then beat yourself up until closing time about how nobody recognizes your artistic brilliance. 

It’s all permission and no control. It’s high labor intensity for low return on investment. I’m sorry, but there has to be a better way to share your art with the world. 

What if, instead of schlepping around from bar to bar every night, you hired yourself as the resident musician for your local public park? That’s what I did. I scoped out an area with a lot of foot traffic, and then just started showing up with my guitar, every weekend, playing and singing as loud as I possibly could, for two hours at a time. 

And audiences just started showing up. Real people who actually wanted to hear my music. And not only would they listen and sing and dance and give me money and take pictures and record videos and take my business card and email me the next day, but they would tell their friends. Which meant I had to come back every week. 

And so, I created an artist’s residency for myself. I officially incorporated my art into the community. I became a fixture. Not because I put my name on a list, but because I just showed up started singing. 

Rand’s famous question says it all:

Are you asking who’s going to let you, or who’s going to stop you? 

That’s the beauty of hiring yourself. The world is not going to tap you on the shoulder and say, thanks, but you’ve got to stop now. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…

Are you giving open mic nights the power to make or break your career?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…

For a copy of the list called, “50 Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *

Scott Ginsberg

That Guy with the Nametag

Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.  

[email protected]

www.nametagscott.com

Never the same speech twice. Customized for your audience. Impossible to walk away uninspired.

Now booking for 2016-2017.

Email to inquire about fees and availability. Watch clips of The Nametag Guy in action here!