For all of you who have done business coaching with me before and heard me stay “don’t waste time agonizing over your website”….here, you can hold my drink while I eat this hat.
I don’t usually work in the school holidays, but I’m itching to do some much needed catch up so decided to work FOR my business instead of IN or ON it for the next fortnight.
So, I’ve been agonizing over a new website. Which font? Which colours? Will the right people like it? What if it doesn’t convert? I’ve spent about two days analyzing, and filling a notebook with scribbles.
I’s funny because about 10 days ago I was rushing to get some roses into their new garden bed. In the process of shovelling dirt back and forth, a little spotted pardalote (a teeny, tiny spotted bird) kept coming to sit on the pile of dirt, whistle and tilt his head at me.
I don’t usually work in the school holidays, but I’m itching to do some much needed catch up so decided to work FOR my business instead of IN or ON it for the next fortnight.
So, I’ve been agonizing over a new website. Which font? Which colours? Will the right people like it? What if it doesn’t convert? I’ve spent about two days analyzing, and filling a notebook with scribbles.
I’s funny because about 10 days ago I was rushing to get some roses into their new garden bed. In the process of shovelling dirt back and forth, a little spotted pardalote (a teeny, tiny spotted bird) kept coming to sit on the pile of dirt, whistle and tilt his head at me.
I watched as he carefully investigated the dirt pile, hopping back and forth and pecking. He was sussing out a potential nest site.
Sure enough, the next day he brought his lady friend along and they made a little tunnel. I felt part delight, but part trepidation – are these birds nuts? Shouldn’t’ they wait until it’s not so windy, or it stops raining? What if the pile of dirt collapses? What if my dogs bark and scare them off?
Of course, it rained. We also had sleet and gale force winds this week. I was sad but relieved to see the birds moved on. They’ve moved nearby, I think, because I still hear their distinctive chirp. Hopefully they found a better home!
It has reminded me that taking some action, even if imperfect is better than no action and just doing what everyone else does – waiting for “I’ll be happy when” or the perfect time.
I’ve been waiting to do a rehaul of my website for years. About six years in fact. It’s time to start again from scratch with a rebrand. It’s exciting, but a new website is (a) a lot of work and (b) a perfect opportunity for shadow to come up; and it has, big time.
The urge to do more, go faster and get something out into the world as soon as possible.
A fun exercise has been to see how many times on my website I can communicate that I’m actually anti-hustle, anti-Gary V books, and very much PRO slow living.
As I sit and work on this new website, my oldest daughter is with me. I remember back to the time I was working on my existing one – almost six years ago. With her crawling around on the floor, dragging her pink bunny and stuffing logo designs and mood board pages in her mouth.
I watch now as she dances in a circle with her beloved bunny and says to me “Mum, look! The slower I spin, the faster I go!”
That has become my anchoring thought. It might take me longer than most to get this new website launched, but I never regret going slower in this phase of life. Yes, the pull to rush ahead and catch up is strong, but there is ALWAYS time to slow down, watch the birds and dance with your bunny.
P.S. This week on the podcast I share my thoughts about why meditation sucks. I read an article this week saying the Calm app recently hit over a hundred million downloads. Amazing, yet I’m concerned people expect mediation to be this lovely, calming experience. We need to be normalizing how difficult, annoying, triggering and even boring meditation can be. Afterall, Buddha never had slick branding and pretty successful at selling the idea of suffering 😉
You can listen to Ep12 of the Mum As You Are Podcast HERE
Erin
