So you decided that entrepreneurship may be for you, but your stuck with all your dreams and ideas in your head! Being a dreamer is a double edged sword at times. You can come up with big ideas, but can't seem to make them a reality.
No matter if you're a middle school or high school student who has always wondered what to do with all these thoughts and ideas in your head, or you're just beginning your entrepreneurial journey, thinking about it, or have been at it for years and are just feeling a little stuck.
Here are 5 tips that I use to get unstuck everyday!
1. Validate your thoughts and ideas. As your thoughts and ideas come, acknowledge them, don't stuff them down because you are afraid of them or whatever other reason. When I would do this, I would literally give myself anxiety that ended up leaving me unmotivated and unproductive.
2. Get them out of your head! Your brain can only hold so much, so get yourself a journal either digital or a good old spiral and write them down! Most people recommend keeping many notebooks in different locations like at your bedside or in your car. I suggest having just 1 central location for all your notes, and you will see why in one of my other tips. So using the notes app on your phone would be perfect, since that is always with you.
3. Divide your thoughts and ideas into buckets. This will help you see that you really do have enough ideas and strategies to support your goal of actually going out and turning that dream into a reality. I found that when things are scattered all over the place, you tend to forget about other ideas you had and end up justifying that this is the reason why you can't move your vision forward. You would be surprised at how all your "random" thoughts and ideas align to your business's purpose or mission. Which is why I suggest using one place to write in.
4. Keep it real! Put your list away and give your brain a chance to process it. A few days to a week. Come back and realistically ask yourself..."Do these ideas align with who I am?" "Do these topics make me happy?" "Can I talk about these topics with a perfect stranger?" "What are my personal connections to the idea?" Be honest with yourself about the fact that you have great ideas, but they may not all be for you to fulfil.
5. Clean it up! As you work through your process and ask yourself these questions, give those ideas the boot that don't align! The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing expecting a different result. We can't keep holding on to business ideas that don't even align with us as a person. We've got to change what we have been doing to get different results. They may not be the results we think we want, but it's definitely going to keep us moving in a forward motion and not in the stagnant position you are currently in.
At the end of the day what your business stands for has to be an extension of you in some way, the more the better. There are going to be dark, hard, long days, and your connection to your business has to be deeper than the money. Because in the beginning there IS NO MONEY! Just your blood, sweat,and tears, and if you're lucky you have a small team. So grab a notebook or your phone and get all those thoughts in one place!