On July 30, my daughter turned 5. She had been eagerly anticipating this event for weeks and weeks. Every morning she would ask, “Is it my birthday yet?” I’d tell her that her birthday was still two weeks away. “Is that the day after this day?”

When the big day finally arrived, we sang her happy birthday. She told us it wasn’t her real birthday. Confused, we asked her why not.

“Because I don’t feel any different. My clothes still fit!”

We laughed. We explained to her that you don’t just get bigger overnight. You grow just a little every day, and don’t notice it until much time has passed.

After thinking about it, I realized I’m sometimes guilty of expecting the same thing. My business is growing, but isn’t yet where I’d like it to be. I get frustrated because I feel that the hard work I’m putting in should be garnering much more reward. I guess I’m expecting to wake up one day and be a smashing success – completely different than the day before.

Of course it doesn’t work that way. Effort, like growth, builds over time. When I look at where I am today compared to when I went out on my own, I can see that my efforts have paid off.

I can take heart in this. I know that if I keep it up, I – just like my daughter – will be big someday.

Service providers become elite by doing only the absolute finest work for clients.

Becoming elite requires that you only work with the very best partners. In my case as a writer that means the tip top designers, interactive developers, agencies, etc.

This also requires that you only work with clients that will allow you to do your very best work. In my case, this would be clients that have a real story to tell. Clients whose products or services are actually worth talking about. Not clients who [ACTUAL QUOTE FROM CLIENT] “pretty much do the same thing as everyone else.”

It sounds so very simple, and yet…

• It requires that you get an opportunity with these “best” partners and clients.
• It requires that you turn down work from mediocre partners and clients.

Both of these can be quite difficult. Turning down work is extraordinarily hard, especially when you:

A. need the money, B. need the experience, or C. need both.

And how can you get the experience you need to get in front of cool clients when you have no experience to show?

Early in 2009, I turned down some work from a web developer. Let’s call him Mr. NO! (as in “NO! you did not just show that piece of unfinished crap to the client!!!!”) I had done work with this person in the past, and had been shocked and embarrassed at the work he produced. When Mr. NO! e-mailed me some months later and asked if I could help him with some other projects he was working on, I politely declined.

As the state of the economy began to have dire effects on my client base (and therefore my income), I began to sorely regret this decision. Why hadn’t I just taken the business? It would have meant income.

Now that 2009 is past – and with it the days of not having enough freelance work – I’m really, really glad I didn’t take that work. I can see now that it would have kept me busy doing crappy work that I wouldn’t have wanted to show anyone. It would have also prevented me from landing gigs that produced work I’m very proud of.

I think becoming elite requires a mix. When you start out,  shoot for 90% anything, 10% elite.
As you gain more experience, that mix should slowly reverse until you’re at 10% (or less) anything, 90% elite.

Are your percentages where you want them to be? How can you shift them?

As someone who grew up active in band, choir and piano (and dreamed of being a Broadway superstar!), I honestly don’t listen to music much now-a-days. I’m more of a book on tape girl. (I’m almost finished with Adored by Tilly Bagshawe and it’s trashy and fabulous for all you ladies who need a beach read.)

But recently, I’ve been using music to jolt my creativity, and it’s been working like a charm.

Let the movie in your mind be influenced by the soundtrack

While working on packaging for a clothing line, I played a few songs that make me feel happy. With that as my soundtrack, I envisioned a customer opening the package. How does it look? What are they excited to see inside? What surprises them? What do they do with the clothes inside?

With each song, I got a few different ideas. The person in my imagination who opened the package to Just Haven’t Met You Yet had different reactions than the person who opened the package to Just Dance.

If you’re trying to create a certain feeling, play a song that creates that feeling in you while you brainstorm ideas.

Let the soundtrack influence your mind movies

Last week, I was totally stuck trying to come up with some ideas for a project. I didn’t even know where to start. I put on a song I never really listen to. It was Beethoven’s Symphony 5 (understatement to call it a “song,” I know). I thought of the brand I was working on in the context of this song. What was it doing to evoke the feeling of this music? This activity, though rather silly, was enough to give me some starter ideas that later became great concepts.

When brainstorming new ideas, listen to music outside your usual playlist.

How can you use music to jump start your creativity?

I thought everyone had caught on to this game by now. Customers like to feel special. It gets our attention.

Here, I feel special:

One of the trainers at my gym sent me an e-mail last Friday. He told me that it had been very nice to meet me last week, and asked if I would like to schedule my next complimentary work out with him (this is a monthly perk from my gym). And by the way, he is having a 40% off personal training sale through the end of this month.

Hmmm. I had some birthday money ear marked for a yoga pass at one of the area studios, but this is an even better deal. It’s one on one, and it’s cheaper. I like this trainer, and although I like the yoga studio too, no one has sent me a personal e-mail asking me to come back this summer. I signed up with him.

With this simple, three sentence e-mail, the trainer made me an easy sale.

Here, not so much:

I got some mail from Sears portrait studio today. On the back it says “By Special Invitation Only…” Inside, “Exclusively for you: A complimentary 16X20 wall portrait.”

On the front? “Laura Rees or Current Resident.” Guess I wasn’t hand-picked for this exclusive, special invite.

If you can’t make customers feel special, at least be honest. They could have said, “Only with this coupon” instead of all those lies about special invitations and exclusivity.

How are you making your customers feel special (or at least being honest)?

For a long time, I carried a lot of guilt about not having a family meal on a regular basis. I mean, by all accounts, this is what makes a family, right? Sitting down at dinner each night, spending quality time.

I treasured family dinners when I was growing up. We laughed and talked. My mom served something homemade alongside vegetables from our garden. I set the table and got drinks. My baby sister annoyed me. My dad wondered aloud if this is what dinosaurs tasted like as he ate chicken (every time). We all had our roles, and the regularity was comforting and safe.

Meal times are, unfortunately, not like this at my house. My kids almost never eat what my husband and I are having. In fact, my son gags quite convincingly when we force him to sample things. My daughter eats about two bites and then either asks for dessert or says she’s not hungry. My son inevitably has to use the bathroom about 5 minutes after we sit down. My daughter sings loudly and my son complains. And it goes on.

The other night, I sat us all down. I even made something different specifically for the kids. When we were all seated, I asked my daughter to put her napkin in her lap. In a typical show of 4 year old defiance, she flatly refused. Repeatedly. I’d had all I could take. I grabbed her by the arm and looked her right in the eye. PUT YOUR NAPKIN IN YOUR LAP OR YOU WILL GO STRAIGHT TO YOUR ROOM AND STAY THERE ALL NIGHT WITH NO DINNER AT ALL, I told her through clenched teeth.

She did put her napkin in her lap, but unfortunately my obvious loss of temper killed whatever mood may have been present for a happy family dinner. I had put everyone on edge. The kids ate in silence, while my husband and I made a stilted attempt at conversation.

Later, as I cleaned up, I had something of an epiphany. I asked myself why in the world I kept forcing us all through these stressful dinners. My underlying goal has always been family togetherness. Is this really the kind of togetherness I want us to remember? I thought about how often we do fun things as a family.

We go to the zoo and Zoombezi Bay on a regular basis. We have family movie night with popcorn and junk food. We swing in the back yard and take hikes at the metro parks. During these activities, we are all together. More importantly, we are all having fun. Decidedly different than family meal times.

So I’m ditching them. Guilt free. In my preconceived notions of family dinner time, I forgot the real reason for having them. I want a happy family and fun family memories, and for us, that means canceling the family dinner.

This has also prompted me to look at the goals behind other activities I engage in. Is there a better, albeit less conventional way, to get there?

What activities can you get rid of or change – weekly all staff meetings anyone? – to reach your goals more effectively?

This summer has been crazy so far. With school out, our nice constant schedule has been completely obliterated. It seems we’re always running to one thing or another – summer camps, birthday parties, piano lessons, play dates. But all this time with my kids has really recharged my creative juices. It’s taken me out of my rut of being so “adult.” The kids are constantly challenging my view of the way things “should be,” and have made me take the time to ask myself, well – why not?

My 9 year old son wanted to dye his hair. My initial reaction was no way. But then I figured who’s it really going to hurt? Now, we’re all sporting cool red streaks.

My 4 year old daughter wanted to make Halloween cut out cookies. In June. I told her Halloween wasn’t for another few months and we needed to choose more appropriate cookie cutters. She gave me the world’s saddest look (as only a 4 year old can), and said, “But I’ve never made Halloween cookies.” Good point. She hasn’t. And this was an exercise to keep her entertained after all. We decorated spooky moons, scared cats, floating ghosts, and orange pumpkins with bright buttercream frosting and tons of sprinkles.

From wearing our bathing suits around the house to spraying each other with the hose at 8 in the morning, we’ve been having more fun than ever. And this why not philosophy is spreading into my work as well. It’s banished some mental blocks and allowed me to look at everything differently, resulting in a better, more creative product for my clients.

What can you do to motivate your why not creativity?

For the most part, my site is back up. Hoorah! After my unfortunate hacking, I have a few lessons learned. Please take it from me and don’t let this happen to you!

1. Always update wordpress and install security. Seriously. ALWAYS.

2. Always back up. After years of writing content for clients in information security, really, I should know better than this – don’t you think? But sadly, I had no backups installed on my old site. So the first thing GoDaddy asks when I call to ask how I can fix a hacked site was, “Do you have a back up?” Um, no. Not so much.

3. Take time to work on your own materials. This is so hard to do when you have clients who are actually paying you for your hard work. Who wants to do your own stuff for free? That’s why my website sat here with a “Sorry, but I got hacked” message for so long. But then a potential client called. He wanted to take a look at some of my work on my site. I had to explain why my site was down, and it was embarrassing. It was the motivation I needed to get in gear and get something put together.

Unfortunately, my site got hacked and I’m starting over. If you’d like to know more about me while I’m putting my site back up, visit me on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/laurarees.

Tomorrow

My kids were off school between Christmas and New Years, so we had a lot of quality time together. My son is content to entertain himself, but my four year old, Lillian, loves nothing more than my constant attention.

“Will you play Hungry Hungry Hippos?”
“Can we dress Barbies?”
“Let’s be family.” (I always have to play the dad to Lillian’s mom, but I’m not allowed to lower my voice to an appropriate octave.)
“Would you color with me?”

And on and on. Most of the time, I was happy to oblige. However, one day (after hours of baby dolls and crayons) I’d had enough.

“I’ll play with you tomorrow,” I told her. She kept asking, and I kept telling her tomorrow.

Early the next day, I awoke to a soft patting on my shoulder.

“Mom?” said Lillian, standing at my bedside. “Is it tomorrow?”

Many people make plans to begin projects now, in the first month of every year. I’d say even more plan to start them tomorrow. That is to say when the timing is right, or when the market is better, or fill in your own excuse here. It’s easy for tomorrow to stretch into days and weeks and months. I’m often guilty of this myself.

But this year, I’ve resolved to be inspired by Lillian’s sense of tomorrow.

“Mom, is it tomorrow?”

Yes, it is.

I just counted, and according to my GoodReads page, I’ve read 46 books this year. Now, to be fair, I have to admit that most of it was escape fiction. Not too many life changing pieces of literature. But I made a conscious effort to read instead of watching TV this year, so I’m pleased with the effort.

If you’re a reader too, I thought you might like a list of the best ones. Note that most of these were not published in 2009 – that’s just when I read them.

Best “Serious” Books

The Blue Sweater, by Jaqueline Navogratz

Part biography and part call to action, this is a quick and inspiring read. It follows Navogratz’s life of service, mainly in Africa where she established one of the first micro lending institutions. She focuses on charitable work that isn’t just charity, but a means for people to become financially independent – essentially helping people to help themselves.

Escape From Cubicle Nation, by Pamela Slim

If you ever wondered if there was anything more than life in corporate America, this is a good one for you. Slim gives you the practical steps you need to take to formulate a plan to (eventually) quit your job and launch your own business. It is well written and funny.

Best Non-fiction

When You Are Engulfed in Flames, by David Sedaris

You’ve got to have a dark sense of humor to appreciate Sedaris, but luckily I do. I found this book vastly entertaining, and laugh out loud funny in several places. Like many truly funny people, Sedaris has a knack for making light of things that are quite serious.

Best Romance

Smooth Talking Stranger, by Lisa Kleypas

If you like romance, you need to read Kleypas. She’s hands down the best romance writer of all times ever. This book is 3rd in a series (first one is Sugar Daddy – don’t knock the name ’til you’ve read it), so start from #1. These books have characters with depth, fast moving plots, and a lot of spice. What else do you need in a romance? Kleypas has written a bunch of good historical romances as well.

Best Action Adventure

Guilty Pleasures, by Laurell K Hamilton

This is the first of the Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series. I know vamps are all the rage right now, but I think Hamilton was one of the first to make them cool (this book was originally published in ‘93). The characters are interesting, the plot and setting are really imaginative. And there’s non stop action from cover to cover. I’ve read 4 or 5 in this series so far, and each keeps getting better.

Best Mystery

Southern Vampire Mysteries series, by Charlaine Harris

I know, I know, more vampires. But they’re good books! This is the series on which the HBO show True Blood is based. Each book is told in first person by telepathic waitress, Sookie Stackhouse. Lots of action and plot twists, and Harris does an excellent job of keeping Sookie’s life (outside of her mystery solving) fresh and interesting. The first one is good (Dead Until Dark – and I would read them in order), but like the Anita Blake series above, each one keeps getting better. They are especially delightful to listen to on CD.

Honorable Mention

Dead Witch Walking, by Kim Harrison

This is the first in The Hallows series. The books are about a witch, Rachel Morgan, and have some really funny and likable characters like a pixie named Jenks and a demon named Al. The only reason I didn’t rate this as a “best” is that the most recent book in the series was not as good as the others. I’m hoping the next one gets better.

Happy Reading!