So I’m breaking the main rule that I set myself for doing book reviews on the every first one. I said in the introductory post that I’d note just the top 10 ideas in the book. But this book – Everything I Know, by Paul Jarvis – contained too many cool ideas, so I got carried away and typed them all up. I’ll try to really condense the points in future so the reviews aren’t so long and it’s easier to hone in and retain the best bits!
Here it is:
This short book by Paul Jarvis centres around those who do or are looking to do work that is creative and aligned with their own values. It’s particularly relevant to those on the self-employment journey, whether you’re trying to make a full-time living with a new business or as a freelancer, or you’re launching projects, testing ideas, and sharing your creative work on a public platform. Major themes include: The importance of being yourself, staying true to your values, and carving out your own path. Taking action in spite of fear and uncertainty. The dangers of perfectionism, excessive promotion, and trying to emulate others. And plenty more…
Here are the top takeaways
- Be yourself. This is difficult to do because it requires vulnerability which in turn requires a lot of courage. The ultimate aim should be to narrow the gap between your true self and your projection of who you are (your personal brand).
- Have role models by all means, but treat them as starting points. You don’t have to emulate anyone, in fact it’s probably best not to. We often want to emulate other’s success, but not the fact that they probably achieved their success through being themselves.
- It’s not all about you. Passion for your work is not enough. You need to find the intersection where people will take notice, find value and pay for what you produce or provide (which can be hard to do). Your audience is obviously key if you want to make money out of your work. Make them the centre of the story, not yourself or your product/services. Inspire them to be better, focus on what they want and use their language.
- Be wary of advice (including this advice!). You need to try things for yourself. What works or doesn’t work for one person could have the opposite effect for someone else. Listen to yourself and try to follow your own path even as you’re (inevitably) unsure about where it might lead.
- Be unique. Do this by being yourself, even (and perhaps especially) if this means being weird. Be as honest as possible. Stand out, don’t blend in. People will appreciate this, as we like people who seem human (i.e. less than perfect) because this is how we all are. And be yourself from the start; don’t wait until you’ve achieved some recognition to let your true self emerge.
- Define and be guided by your internal values and motivations, which may need to be constantly revaluated as you progress. This will give your work meaning. When you’re trying to pick a path being value-driven makes it infinitely easier to see what work will make you fulfilled. It’s critical to care about what you do. And a great thing happens when you focus on work you love – more of it starts to appear. We tend to get more of the things we get.
- Doing the actual work trumps promotion. Dressing something up won’t work unless there’s already some value there. Ideally you want to be too busy doing the actual work to promote yourself. [Note – this doesn’t really apply to newbies who need to do a lot of marketing and client hunting when starting out. Paul already had a bunch of clients when he started his web design business so he could focus most of his time on delivering great work straight away].
- The great benefit of being self-employed is that you can work when you want. You can take time off from work – a couple of months here, a few afternoons there, even an entire year. The key to doing this is to live more frugally. Define an amount of money that you’d be happy earning and don’t bother working beyond this to earn any more.
- Keep in mind the power of stepping away and stopping work as a guaranteed way to gain a fresh perspective. After returning from a break answers suddenly seem obvious. Sometimes not working, or working less, can be the best thing for your work.
- Know when to say “no”. Time and energy are limited resources. Though as a beginner, when you can’t afford to be so picky, it does make sense to say yes more often.
- It can be detrimental to focus on the future, on goals and on outcomes. All we really need to do is focus on doing work in the present. Future focus can lead to excess worry, wasted time (e.g. through producing detailed business plans) and a sense of entitlement.
- You can’t predict what will happen. The only way to know if an idea will work is to try it and see.
- Act in the face of fear. We can’t avoid being judged (what many fears revolve around). So we may as well get on and put things out there anyway. Fear never really goes away, but we can get a lot better at pushing past it. Just do things regardless of feeling fearful. Then fear loses its power (for a while at least!)
- Don’t try to please everyone, not even those who you know like you. Focus on what you want to say, not the public reception.
- The secret to success is not glamorous. Do the work you do as often as possible, even when you don’t feel like it. Bursts of creativity and productivity can strike when we least expect them.
- Break down creative or daunting work into small tasks. And then only think about tying all the parts together near the end.
- Try to ignore your inner critic and stifle self-censorship whilst your creating. Save them for the editing phase.
- Don’t repeat something that isn’t working. It seems obvious, but you need to change something to get a different result.
- Human intentions are pretty evident. People can generally see through other people quite easily. If you have genuinely good intentions, it’ll show. A sales pitch always sounds sales-y. Focus on helping people, not getting money.
- Perfectionism can stop you finishing things. It’s pretty much impossible to make something perfect anyway. Better to launch a less than perfect product than get sucked into endless cycles of refining. Focus on big ideas over small details, especially in the early phases when you’re launching and testing.
- Take a stand. Draw a line in the sand to make your values (why you do what you do) clear to people. This may well alienate some or most people, but it makes it easier for those people who will resonate with your work to find you. Once you find your people, focus on connecting individually (especially at first), be as honest as possible and focus on your shared values.
- Expect failure. It’s almost a requirement for success. Persistence is so important in order to be able to navigate the setbacks and wrong turns.
- Persisting and finishing stuff: After the initial passion wears off things start to seem more laborious. You may abandon the project (though usually not through some grand gesture; simply through working on it less and less until you forget about it L). When this happens think back to your initial intentions to help refocus and motivate yourself.
- The process can be difficult. It typically involves many horrible drafts, bad ideas and mistakes along the way. Creating a final product involves a lot of curation, editing and iteration that is hidden from public view (which is why comparing yourself to others is not good – you’re not comparing like with like). Try not to focus on the end goal, as this can lead to frustration with the work you have to do to get there. Create as badly as you need to get things created. It sometimes helps to intentionally create bad drafts just to remove the fear of perfection and get started!
The post Everything I Know, Paul Jarvis appeared first on Sian Atkins.