Blaze your own trail!
I was reading Andrea Lee’s blog and she offers this:
“How might you be giving too much power away to others? Do you try to ‘be like’ someone, model yourself on someone or someones, a little too much?It’s fine to follow footsteps but not with your head down. When you’re taking a walk in the woods, if you don’t lift your head, it doesn’t matter if you’ve arrived at a beautiful meadow, does it?”
WHOA. That’s a thinker for sure.This very topic has been on my mind quite a bit lately and I’ve actually talked about it with several friends.
In the industry that I’m in, there is a particular coach who has many, many followers. You can pretty much tell who they are… they all use the same e-mail template, they all use almost the same web site techniques - but most notably - they all talk about how much money they make while working almost no hours (I’m going to blog about this last point later in the week, but for now, let’s talk about blazing your own trail…).
So anyway, I keep running across these graduates of this particular person, and I’m very happy that they are seeing so much success. That’s awesome - because the more success we all see as a whole, the more success there is to gain for everyone.
But anyway, way back when I was just starting my coaching business, I almost fell into line with all of these other people and felt that maybe I too, should follow this prescribed way of building a business.
But - every time I took a step in that direction… when I went to purchase a product from this coach, or when I went to change something about the way I was doing things to fall in line with this person… I resisted.
And, for a while, I had a battle raging inside my head. You see, something about the way this person sold her coaching, and the way she conducted herself just didn’t sit right with me. Now, she’s not a bad person… and she’s extremely knowledgeable. However - just something about her methods did not fully resonate with me.
So, the battle would go something like this “Gee… I see all these people being so successful doing the same things that this person does… maybe I should do them too…. Hmmm… something about it just doesn’t feel right - I’m going to do things my way. But - wait - she DOES have good information… and she seems to know what she’s talking about - maybe I’m wrong, maybe I won’t be successful until I do it HER way…”
And therein lies the problem - me thinking I’m wrong for doing things the way I want to do them - for thinking I’m wrong because my way isn’t exactly like this person’s way.
I finally came to the realization that, if I’m out of alignment with my authentic self, my business won’t be hugely successful no matter who I try to follow… or copy. I wasted so much energy with that scattered focus.
I love what Andrea Lee offers in her blog post - it rings incredibly true for me.
You do not have to copy someone else’s success - you can forge your own… in a way that is completely authentic to you.
What’s stopping you from blazing your own trail?
