Keep designing, keep trying, keep working; it’ll happen
It seems like it’s always when you give up on something that it finally happens. But you can’t pseudo give-up, you have to really be done with the whole thing. Theory of the day anyways. Today, we got a thank-you note from Brooke Shields. The awesome thing is that this is thank you note from a celebrity for something besides our blankets. She received one of our hooded reversible ponchos. And she mentioned the poncho doubles as a security blanket and thumb sucking aide. Awesome! It was so out-of-the-blue and actually came to a different address than I would have expected.
Last week’s good surprise was a feature of one our our onesies (graphic is my husband’s design) in the print magazine “Yogi Times”. They sent us a copy and said “you’ve been featured” and I flipped!!! Our first free print publicity.
Besides my belief that things happen after you’ve given up on them, (by the way - “giving up” is not a good philopophy to live, or run a business, by), I’m also a firm believer that if you keep working hard towards your dream, you’ll slowly watch it unfold in front of your eyes. Not that I ever specifically dreamed we’d get a thank-you note FROM BROOKE SHIELDS, oh my goodness! especially for a fashion item which I designed, but definitely I dreamed one day a celebrity would notice our stuff.
Each time one of these wonderful *exciting* things happens, it motivates us to kick it up a notch. Which leads to another of my recent theories; if things are going good and you’re working hard, then you’ll never be totally “on top” of things. If you’re truly hungry, each success will push you take on too much, to keep chasing after that next notch on your ladder, never fully satisfied. Which I guess is why I love watching reality shows with design challenges like “Project Runway” or “Top Design” - because it’s so refreshing to see that being overly ambitious is a common trait and that pushing the deadline right up until that moment you absolutly have to run out the door, is just as common; no matter how much experience you have under your belt.
Granted, the above work habits are not the greatest example of stellar project management, or slick organization skills, but I believe they are good signs for success potential - to be able to constantly push yourself to be the best that you can be.
My husband is a coach and it’s one of his best post-game lines which always sticks in my head; which always pushes me on: “On a scale of one to five, how would you rate your level of effort right now?”
Be honest.
1 comment April 14th, 2007