What I Learned About Success From Vanessa Lau

by vanessa | Aug 14, 2019 | Blog, Entrepreneurs, Success

What I learned about success from vanessa lau.

Vanessa is a business coach that helps millennials quit their 9-5 so that they can chase after their dreams.

I was lying on the couch one day, staring at the ceiling and I had a pit in my stomach. I was struggling to grow my Instagram account and make waves with my blog.

For months, I had been waking up at ridiculous times, all so that I could pursue this thing called starting a business for myself. I had a headache that just wouldn’t go away and I was feeling defeatist which was my normal mood.

Most times I was on cloud nine, but today I was tired of endlessly pursuing my dreams and hearing crickets. I just wanted to give up. What is an unemployed girl supposed to do.

I had given up years ago on pursuing a 9-5 job because when I sent out fillers all I heard was the clicking of my keyboard and then nothing. Most days were spent with me watching television and I was starting to become a couch potato. Flash forward years into the future and I was actually doing it. One day, I decided to talk to my niece about was I going through.

“Maybe, I should change my brand. I mean, it could be that I am just not getting fillers because no one is interested. It is not like I can sell products to myself.”

She looked at me and with the wisdom of most nineteen years old, she said. “Yeah, maybe.”

No one was going to give me the answers I needed so I decided to search for myself. After that is what Google is there for so I have been told countless times and I dove headfirst into the murky waters to see what I could find.

This is what most gurus talk about when it comes to success, that there’s no such thing as overnight success stories. We hear all about it because who doesn’t want to be motivated and they are motivating. I couldn’t find anything on Google to ease my heart so I went to Youtube and something popped up in my feed. What drew me to the video was that we shared the same first name then the second thing I looked at what was the title. It was about how to grow your Instagram account.

I watched the video, it was the first time I heard about Vanessa Lau, I have embarrassed to even say that especially when I found out that she was a millennial business coach. I had believed for the longest time I knew all the top dogs in the millennial niche. I realized with shame that wasn’t the case at all and I started to look up anything, I could about her.

Vanessa saw the world in a way that almost every successful person does. I subscribed to her email list then and then hoped onto her Facebook group. I knew of a few people who had achieved the success she had, but I discovered that she was different from most entrepreneurs.

A question played in my mind, “how much are you willing to sacrifice to go after your dreams?”

It was from a documentary I watched weeks ago called the “Age of the Entrepreneur,” and now I had to ask that question. Often when it comes to entrepreneurs or anyone that’s successful, we never see their sacrifice or hard it was to reach to the top, but with Vanessa Lau, I came to understand that nothing comes easy.

In fact, most things are hard to achieve and it takes time to move the needle. These are the five things I learned about success from Vanessa Lau.

Not everyone’s backstory is the same

“You need a job, most successful people had a job and then they made their money on the side,” I often heard when I spoke to people about my dreams.

“Yeah, I have been trying that for years, still have no job. It isn’t like I can go to someone else’s office and do a whole Beautiful Mind thing and be offered a

job.” They’d shake their heads and mumble something under their breath.

When you listen to the advice of successful people, most of them say things like don’t quit your job. Instead, keep working and start saving money for your dream career. Well, they have a point, but there are a lot of people who don’t have that choice.

A lot of people no matter how much they try, can’t get employed and find themselves watching Youtube videos of how to make money online. Take Lewis Howes, for example, he was sleeping on his sister’s couch and came up with an idea to help people on LinkedIn get jobs. Eventually, with time, he started making strides and he then created the School of Greatness.

Then there’s Vanessa Lau who quit her job without a backup plan. She left her glamorous corporate job and ended up working as a part-time coffee barista to support herself while working on launching her business.

Invest in yourself

“I mean why would I pay for something if I can get it free online,” I hear a lot of times.

“Well, Youtube is great and all, but you still are missing out on important information.”

“Online courses are a scam,” after hearing that I would nod and change the subject.

It is normal to want to not pay for anything after all nowadays you can literally get anything for free. And that is the problem, I get it, spending money that you don’t have is terrifying because if everything plops then well what do you do next. You can’t exactly go to your family members and ask for money.

But investing in yourself is important, more than that it is necessary if you want to be successful. In my early twenties, all I did with my money was buy food from expensive restaurants and movie tickets. I didn’t invest in myself, I saw no need to do that, I didn’t learn any new skills and that was the problem.

Vanessa Lau while working as a barista invested in herself, bought courses and surrounded herself with six and seven-figure entrepreneurs. We all know that

that what a barista earns is crummy and yet she found a way. Danial DiPiazza from Rich 20 Something was a waiter before he started his freelancing career and within four months had made enough to launch his business.

Vanessa Lau knew there was more to life

I had a dream internship way back in 2014, the first six months of the year was like a dream. I had lived in Switzerland and now I was living in South Africa, doing my internship. I was also getting paid, it was unbelievable, but the problem was that I was depressed. I had to get onto a train to get to my workplace and I dragged my feet ever day.

The job was boring and I looked forward to Fridays like most of us do when we are working. For other people in certain parts of the world they look forward to their Saturdays.

“Is this what working is like?” I asked my mother on the phone.

“That’s what growing up is like,” she said. “With time you will get used to it.”

I nodded, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. I felt this emptiness that I couldn’t describe. Later on, I realized most people feel this way, they don’t like looking forward to their weekends. They drag their feet on Mondays, over indulge in coffee, they loathe their bosses and don’t believe the message of the company.

Even people from Facebook eventually lead their jobs because there’s no perfect job unless you work for yourself.

Peter Voogd, the millennial thought leader, once said, “you either are building your dream or someone elses.”

That statement changed the way I looked at life. Vanessa Lau must have felt the same at one time because she worked on her dream knowing that there was

something more out there and she just had to followed the yellow bricked road or in this case the steps to get to where to wanted to go.

Hustle is the name of the game

I was at the top of my class in Switzerland, I can’t tell you how competitive schooling in Switzerland is like. They believe in bulking one year of school into six

months.

For me, getting there wasn’t easy. My parents had to take a loan to pay $24,000 for the six months I’d be there and I had got there late. Normally, nothing

happens in the first week of school. Boy, was I wrong? I was so behind, they had already begun writing their thesis report papers and I had to catch up and

that wasn’t easy.

I believed as most millennials do that if you go to an overly priced school, hustle until your eyeballs pop out of your skull, make it into the top position and

you will get a good job. I did all that, had an internship and I found myself unemployed despite pulling all the stops. Most millennials believe that a job will fix

everything, in the past it did, but now it doesn’t.

I am not saying that a job is bad if it is for you then great. Vanessa Lau like a lot of millennials are made to believe in a lie that society often tells. Unlike most

millennials she went after her dreams despite the odds because she understood that a job won’t satisfy you.

I know a lot of people who feel as if their job isn’t satisfying them, but they still do it because they think that’s the only choice they have. That it is the only

thing that they can do. I get it, but at the same time. I ask myself the question, is it worth it in the end.

If you are strapped for cash and want to start making money on the side to help you build your business, here are quick side-hustle ideas to get you started.

You need a mentor

One thing that people always struggle with is paying for a mentor, but here’s the thing if you want to get to the top a lot quicker then it is important that you

have one. The difference is paying for a course or a book is that it only delivers a handful of great advice. A book can only tell you so much about how to

achieve success before it becomes redundant and the same thing for a course.

There are so many books that I read and invested money in buying courses. Invested time in watching webinars, but I couldn’t ask questions. Before Vanessa

Lau could achieve success, she had to surround herself with people who where were she wanted to be. Last month, I invested in a mentor. It was worth every

penny because even though the information is free there are still missing pieces. For example, how to successful people find affordable virtual assistants?

You can only learn this from investing in a course or how do you find a loan for your business. There are plenty plus solutions out there to meet your needs,

you just have to look for them.

I have learned so much in one month then I have learned in three years of paying for courses. Every successful person has had a mentor and still has one.

Vanessa Lau is no different.

You need to be consistent

Every entrepreneur says the same thing, you need to be consistent, whether it is with your blog, growing your Facebook groups or Instagram. You have to be

follow through, but I had no idea how powerful it truly was until Vanessa Lau sent an email letting her email subscribers know that she has grown her

Youtube account to 100,000 in a year. Yup, not an exaggeration. In a year, that’s incredibly inspirational and I think most people don’t talk about consistency

enough and it can get overlooked.

Being an entrepreneur is a lot of work, in fact, it requires dedication and effort to make things work, and it doesn’t happen overnight. Nathan Chan always

says, if you want to grow your Instagram account be consistent, post once to twice a day. How many of us actually do that, but Vanessa Lau kept doing it and

she’s the epitome of what it means to hustle for your dreams. She has an awesome course on how to grow your Instagram account, you can find it right

here.

Vanessa Lau shows us that success is possible, but it all comes down to how dedicated you are in actually making it happen. She’s a millennial that

understands how important to chase after your dreams, no matter what anyone says. Here are some awesome free resources from Vanessa Lau on

dominating social media and creating an unstoppable brand.

Be respectful and resourceful

I am part of Vanessa’s awesome 10, 000 member group and one of the things she lists down in her announcements is to be respectful. When you are starting

out, it is easy to forget your manners. But even social media requires you to be respectful. Sending messages to people in Facebook groups is disrespectful

and yet a lot of us do it.

Another thing that we do is go to groups and start asking questions without doing our research. When you are starting a business, you need to be

resourceful.

Google has to become your new next best friend and that is the only way you can grow. If you want to achieve momentum then that’s what you have to do.

Vanessa Lau reminded me of that, you need to learn how to be resourceful and then what you learn you can then use to build your brand,

What lessons did you learn from an influencer and it is your main take away from this post? Comment below.

Keep Pushing

Vanessa

5 Habits That Will Change Your Life For The Better

by vanessa | Jun 19, 2019 | Blog, Success

5 habits that will positively improve your life for the better

When your habits change for the better, your life improves.

Last year, I was overcome with darkness, the kind that swallows you up whole and doesn’t want to let you go. I found myself in a place I didn’t think I would. For the first time, in a while, I felt hopeless. It didn’t help that setbacks kept coming my way, I was getting wiser and there I was making the same mistakes. I had no idea what to do next, it was as if I couldn’t find a way out of the darkness.

My life was not the way I wanted it to be and I had no clue what to do next. I knew something had to change when I was on death’s door and

couldn’t see a way out. Out of desperation and despair that is usually when the answers come to us. Often it comes to us, not in the way we want or expect it to be, but when it does that’s when we realize we hit rock bottom.

I had hit rock bottom, it is odd that at the beginning of the year, after writing my yearly goals I believed it would be the best year ever. Sure, a lot of great things happened. I traveled a bit, but that it didn’t take away the emotional pain I was going through, by July I was a wreck and when my birthday rolled out in August, everything shifted. I found myself trapped in the darkest recesses of my mind. It is there that pain and doubt visited me often. Where my courage and self-worth were shattered into pieces.

By October, I was having panic attacks, the memory of the emotional trauma I had gone through haunted me. Seduced me with its words and its vicious images, there were so many nights I cried myself to sleep.

We often want our problems to be solved, but the problem is we don’t make any effort to change our lives. What messes us up are the habits that push us back and always make it hard to move forward. October was when I started changing my habits and they helped me out, I’m sure they’ll do the same in your life.

If you want to get better at your habits, I recommend going to Project Life Mastery. Stefan James has a lot of great resources on how you can

master your habits. My habits used to be bad, but when I started changing them, my life changed and the best habits I implemented were the

ones I listed in this blog post.

Stop with the excuses

How many excuses have you made for not doing something? I was the queen of excuses and often there was a good reason for them. There’s

always a reason for not doing something. Whether it is waking up early in the morning, excising, working on your dreams or even eating healthy.

There’s always a reason and it usually convinces us not to do something. Time is limited, that’s one thing you should remember. We have a number of days in a year and each day we decide what we should with it. When that day is gone, we don’t have it anymore. We can’t go back in time. Whether we like it or not time is running out and we’re getting older. You don’t want to look back and regret it. I understand life happens when we’re making plans and it’s never going to be easy. There will always be a number of reasons why something won’t work out the way you want it to, but if you press on something will come out of it.

Relying on your excuses won’t make you feel better, for a while it might. It might make you comfortable until you realize that the excuse you gave wasn’t as valid as you believed it was.

Stop relying on people solving your problems

Adulting is hard, as kids we couldn’t wait to become adults then it came faster than we thought it would. That didn’t mean that everything fell into place. No, we were expected to solve our own problems, but there was a part of us that still wanted it. The belief was still there that someone else could help us with our lives. The expectation was in our minds when we entered the workforce, got into relationships, bonded with people and even got married.

It is so much easier if people give us advice on what we should do. Rather than listening to our hearts and minds. It has taken me a long time to realize that no one can solve your problems whatever they are. It might be easier, but there will come a time when you’re upset you allowed it to get that far. I am not saying we should be arrogant and walk around as if we know all the answers. There’s a difference in being arrogant and be confident enough in your decisions.

When we allow ourselves to get caught up in waiting for someone to solve our problems, it is easier to find ourselves in a mess that we didn’t

anticipate. I have seen firsthand how destructive it can be. When the person you rely on disappoints you then you find yourself lost.

Gratitude is important

It is hard to be grateful especially with what is going on in the world. But when you don’t practice gratitude you end up complaining. I used to

complain a lot, everything under the sun wasn’t safe from me. If there was nothing in the fridge I would complain instead of taking action. If I was bored, I’d spend a couple of minutes complaining about how I was bored. If someone mistreated me I’d spend a couple of days complaining about it. Okay, you get the point. I loved complaining even if there was no benefit to it.

Complaining once in a while is good for the soul because once you do that you free yourself, but staying in that place isn’t good. If you want to improve your life you need to realize how many great things you have going for you. There was a point in my life where I was so broke, I started going to food banks and looking for food. It lasted a couple of weeks, but once I got out of that space I realized how blessed I was. There are so many people out there suffering, who go hungry because they can’t afford to buy food. That’s how hard life gets.

I don’t know what your life is like, but I can imagine that there are good things in your life. Maybe, you have really good friends or it is your health. Whatever it is realize that you have the chance to do something great. When you practice gratitude, it is so easy to focus on what you want for your life. When you do that you fall in love with yourself.

Don’t be a afraid of focusing on you

I used to be a people-pleaser, it was so bad that my self-worth was built around it. I wanted their validation and to be accepted. There are so many instances in my life where my self-esteem went belly up all because I relied on people to make me happy. Now, I realize that I didn’t love myself enough to understand I didn’t need validation.

Many people grapple with this, believing that it is selfish to focus on you, but it isn’t. Of course, it is all about balance. If all you do is think about yourself then yeah that is selfish, but there are instances when it is important you focus on you. When it directly affects you and no one else then you need to focus on yourself.

For example, never move in with people who you know you aren’t close to. If you are doing it to make them happy you are dipping your toes in murky waters and it won’t end well. If you are spending money you don’t have all so you can prove to your friends that you belong then you’re making a grave mistake. If you’re going after a career you don’t like because you want to please your family then you end up being miserable.

I have done all the above because I wanted to belong, for people to accept me. The problem was I found myself miserable and depression hit when I didn’t get validation. All my fears were realized and I had to ask a hard question, did I truly love myself? I have learned to love myself and focus on me because in the end it is your life.

Let go of your past regrets and mistakes

Regret and mistakes hold us back, they have a way of affecting the way we think. Regret takes far too much of our energy that we have nothing left for anything else. I watched a video a while ago, John Lee Dumas was talking about his Freedom journal. He spoke about how we don’t have enough energy to do what we want because we’re focusing on the wrong things.

When you focus on the negatives, all that it does is impact your life negatively and you can’t move forward. Human beings make mistakes, it is part of the journey. The secret though is finding a way to move forward. This way you make sure you don’t make the same mistakes. Read this post about how to stop letting your past define. The worst thing is never learning from your mistakes. If you regret not working on your dream, take action.

If you regret, not standing up for yourself, start doing it now. It is never too late to start living your best life, you just have to believe that you can do it.

What postive habits have you started doing to improving your life? Comment below

KEEP PUSHING

VANESSA

Is Entrepreneurship Right For You?

by vanessa | Jun 5, 2019 | Entrepreneurs, Success

Is entrepreneurship right for you?

The answer here is to look at what makes you happy. As cliche as it sounds.

Entrepreneurship has become the rage in the last couple of years. Growing up, entrepreneurship was for old men who wanted to do something

else in life so they became entrepreneurs. Now, the tide has changed. Seventeen-year-old kids to college dropouts are entrepreneurs. The

dictionary defines it as, “spending a few years like most people won’t, doing what most people can’t.”

This statement is the true face of entrepreneurship because the truth is the rigid way of doing it has changed. In the 90s, an entrepreneur set up a

good old-fashioned brick-and-mortar business. They employed people, spent most of their time working in the office. Times have changed, an

entrepreneur can be literally anything from a blogger to a Youtuber, even a Social Media Influencer.

That is because with time the form has evolved, even though the definition hasn’t. As I reflect on my life, the one thing I never would have

imagined becoming was an entrepreneur. My father is one, anyone I met would ask me if I ever wanted to follow in my father’s footsteps and I

always shook my head.

To me I saw entrepreneurship as a waste of time and resources, it seemed too complicated. Simply, I wasn’t interested in the idea of doing it.

Entrepreneurship is hard, even as a ten-year-old kid I understood that. It involves risk and certainly. Most people like to be certain of things. I went

to boarding school so for me certainity makes me queasy, but it wasn’t always like this.

Most people can’t be entrepreneurs, that is a fact and most people won’t. It is less to do with your capabilities and more to do with what you’re

willing to risk. I do believe that everyone should follow their passions where it leads them to. I do understand though, a lot of people don’t want

the risk and uncertainty that entrepreneurship brings.

Do you have what it takes

In high school, I had dozens of dreams, but the one that was the strongest was being an author. I am still going after that dream. Most people go

through the same thing, they have dozens of dreams, some pursue them and others change course. A lot of people don’t say they want to be an

entrepreneur. The reason is that we’re taught to walk the wide road and not the narrow one.

Teachers teach us to be employees and not employers. That is the way the system is created unless you go to China, Nigeria, Korea or Japan.

Creativity is encouraged and they push their children to excel in every area. That is why Asians are great at business and why Nigerians are good at

the arts. However, most of us go through life thinking and believing that to be happy we have to be employed. I was talking to my niece yesterday

and she was talking about how she wants to create a natural hair product line. That moment I was immensely proud of her.

Anyone can be an entrepreneur. All you need is an idea and the belief that you can carry it out. That’s it, you don’t have to be a super genius, born

in a rich family, gone to college or have a degree.

What makes a good entrepreneur?

Okay, you want to be an entrepreneur. Well, you need to slap a few traits on you to be a good one. You know those inspirational movies Hollywood

pushes out of the woodwork when you need a confidence boost. From the “Freedom Writers,” to “Race,” they all have common characteristics.

Besides making you cry like a baby with the scores and soundtracks, there’s one common denominator in them. Take a gander.

They all are about struggle, a down and out person who wants to achieve a goal and everyone thinks they are a clown. In the end, they achieve the

ultimatum goal but go through hurdles. Scriptwriters and writers call this the hero’s journey. It starts with the hero having no clue what they want

to do, they have to go through a series of trials and tribulations before they understand their purpose.

In reality, we all go through our own hero’s journey. For some, the trials are harder and for others, it is easier, but to be a great leader or someone

great, tribulations come with the job description. Shakespeare once wrote, “Some are born great, some have greatness thrust upon them and

some achieve greatness.”

This is my favorite quote because it represents so much of our lives. Some people are born with resources that you might not have, some are put

in a position where they can build themselves up. And others have to do it the hard way and work their way up. We all achieve greatness in a

different way and that becomes part of your journey. However, you need five personality traits in order for you to be a great leader and an

entrepreneur. These can easily be learned. As the saying goes practice makes perfect.

Adaptability

You have to be adaptable. There’s no way around that one. I used to hate change as much as anyone and then I got used to it. I can blame it on the

fact I went to eight schools before I went to college or I lived in four continents. Whatever the reason is I can adapt. What I have come to

understand is life changes, for some people, it is a small change and others it is on a larger scale.

We all think we can’t adapt, but we forget that every day we have to change our way of thinking, approach something differently or get accustomed

to a lifestyle. For example, if you get ill, you have to change your regiment. If you start a new job and have to wake up three hours earlier then you

do it. If your boss wants to relocate you, you do it because you have no choice in the matter. Well, you do, but making the wrong choice means

getting fired or your health getting worse.

So, if we can do that, why do we think we can’t adapt. It’s already in our DNA. From the time we start school, we have to adapt, to learning a new

subject, becoming part of a team or learning a new skill.

Curiosity

Yes, we all know the story of how curiosity killed the cat, but what is wrong with being curious. Yes, there are instances when it does nothing but

cause you harm. Unless you have a death wish and are the type of person who thinks you are in a mystery book or in a TV show then curiosity is

harmless. And it is important for becoming an entrepreneur.

Entrepreneurs are curious individuals, they want to learn anything from Physics to literature and that is what makes them diverse. The whole point

is to continue learning, to evolve as your business does and to grow the way that you must. Many entrepreneurs dropped out of college, think Bill

Gates and Steve Jobs.

Passionate

An entrepreneur who isn’t passionate tends to quit when things get hard. And believe me, entrepreneurship is hard most of the time. When you

are passionate about something, it thrills you, and you can do the impossible.

For example, I struggled waking up early, I’d drag my feet to class and sleep late. I would set up five alarms and I never used to hear them. Now, it

is different. Often, people give you secrets to waking up early, but they leave out an important factor. If you aren’t excited to wake up the next day,

you can put ten alarms and you still won’t hear it.

There are days when it is hard when I lose motivation, but I pick myself up. Sometimes, we forget that you won’t like every aspect of what you are

doing. In entrepreneurship this is true, you’ll have to work more than you would at a normal job.

At least in the beginning, so that means, waking up early and working until you hit a breakthrough. They will days when you are not sure you can

keep going. When things don’t work the way you want it. That is how it goes, there’s no perfect job out there because life is beautifully imperfect.

But when you are an entrepreneur what separates you from everyone else is that you are willing to jump through hoops to get to where you want

to go.

If you have no idea where to start from, I wrote a blog post about quick side-hustles you can start with at home. This will help you go in the right

direction.

Resilient

No one wants to fail, and yet everyone in their life has failed at one point in time. There this great quote from Richard Branson, “Few first ventures

work out. It is how a beginning entrepreneur deals with failure that sets that person apart. In fact, failure is one of the secrets to success, since

some of the best ideas arise from the ashes of a shuttered business.”

You have to rise from the ashes of disappointment and failure to get to the top. Because only then will you realize how failure has been building

you up all this time. There’s no successful person out there who hasn’t failed. We have heard the stories time and time again, but we still feel as

though we can’t do it. It’s normal when you don’t know the beginning of someone’s story, it’s hard for it to inspire you.

Here’s one thing you should remember, as kids we failed all the time. We got up despite being mocked or ridiculed. That is because to kids, failure

is part of growing pangs and when we became teenagers, it shifts. Our perspective changed, we saw ourselves as failures and wanted to be like

everyone else.

To be successful, you have to pull out the resiliency you had as a kid. Even if you don’t want to be an entrepreneur, you still need this character

trait to be successful.

Visionary

Vision is what fuels entrepreneurs, without it many have no direction. When it comes to people being visionaries, the picture of a mad genius

comes to mind. But that is further from the truth, being a visionary, help you come up with an idea and understand the direction you have to take.

Sometimes being a visionary is about understanding the bigger picture, think about Amazon or Shopify or even Apple. It started out as a small

business and now it has taken the world by storm. In the beginning, all you have is an idea and that might not feel like much but with time it adds

up.

I loved playing with Legos as a kid, I would take one piece and connect to the next. The fascinating thing about Legos was that it started out with

small plastic blocks and then you built on that. Eventually, from those pieces, you managed to create cities, buildings and even robots. In the

beginning, all it was were blocks. That is what being a visionary is. You start with a small idea that can appear trivial to most people, then you build

on that.

Without visionaries, this world wouldn’t be what it is now. Inventions have been created on ideas, the world changed because people were willing

to build on their visions for the future.

One more thing, here’s a post from Jonathan Fields that will help you decide whether entrepreneurship is right for you.

Do you think entrepreneurship is right for you? Comment below

Keep Pushing

Vanessa

4 Things You Need To Remember When Giving Up

by vanessa | May 22, 2019 | motivation, personal development, Success

4 THINGS you need to remember when giving up

Giving up always comes at a cost and it’s important to remember that.

I woke up early in the morning, my head throbbing and my mouth dry. The day prior I had endured a speech from my parents, telling me I was making a mistake with my life. I understood where they were coming from, here I was working on an online business instead of finding a job. Three years being jobless had made me question my life’s purpose and I knew that sitting in a cubicle wasn’t one of them. There where times when giving up seemed like the only option and I had wanted more than anything to give up, but something within me refused for me to throw the towel in.

The problem was I didn’t know anyone who had done the online thing. My aunt mentioned months ago that her friend had lost everything pursuing making

money online. I started questioning whether I was making a mistake again, I had gone nowhere. And yet, I knew I didn’t want to work for a boss my whole life. I had come to realize working for someone wasn’t for everyone, I had done it for almost a year before I started looking for another company. The company I had worked for before was going under so I had to look somewhere else.

For three months, I watched television, sat on the couch and reflected on my life until I snapped out of it. That is was brought me here to this moment of building an online business. The people who I told, never said anything and I couldn’t blame them. Most people don’t make money online and that’s a fact. The problem most people don’t realize is that more people give up before they even reach their milestones.

There’s A Reason You Started

The reason why giving up seems so much easier is because you forget the reason why you started on the journey. When I was a kid, my favorite song was I can by Nas. I’d nod my head and sing the song. I was motivated to be all I wanted to know. Most kids are told they can be whoever they want and reality hits.

Your dream career is frivolous and people shake their head at the idea. Most of us want to be more than who we become. That’s because we stop believing that we can truly become all we want to be. And that is how doubt comes and turns you around. From going after your dream, you start doubting you can even do it.

There’s always a reason why you started and until you remind yourself then you’ll always let doubt push you back. Adulting is hard, that is due to us believing that has to be. Sure, making tough decisions is hard, but why is it kids are relentless. Maybe because they really don’t care what people think. Little kids care more about learning and making mistakes than they do about what people think.

That is until the tide turns and we strive to make people accept us. What I have realized is people rarely spend time thinking about you unless they have nothing better to do? Normally we get this image of someone thinking about us or what we said. People are so busy with their own lives that they don’t have time to think about what you’re doing.

So, if that’s a reason why you are giving up, you shouldn’t. Then again, you could be going through the many stages of frustration. We all have been there. I used to have massive stage fright until I learned that one of the most important things is your message. This is the reason why you do what you do, what you want to be known for and who you are as a person. Everything else is noise that you need to block.

Remember there are people who have done it before

You’re not alone. There have been people who have done what you are doing at this moment. The number one reason why we give up is we believe that were pioneers. And as we all know pioneers mostly die broke or get shot.

Bit dramatic, but most pioneers make history when they are dead. In the last couple of years, that has changed, there are thousands of people making money online. There are people who have been where you are and that is why you need to look for people who inspire you so that you don’t give up.

You might not know anyone personally, but the proof is plastered on the internet. Stories break out of seventeen-year-old kids building empires to philanthropist self- millionaires. The road doesn’t have to be as hard as you imagine it. You don’t have to go alone and think that there’s no way to the top of the mountain. You have to believe that you can conquer it if someone who was living on the streets can become an entrepreneur then you can do anything. True story, John Paul Dejoria was once homeless and now is a billionaire.

There are hundreds of stories out there are of people defying the odds and most have of them had the belief they were here for a reason. They had faith that their life wasn’t just about odds, but they had a calling. If you want inspiration, just look at Lewis Howes, Chris Gardner, Dani Johnson, and the list goes on. They beat the odds, I truly believe that you as well.

Remember fear is a liar

The first time I decided to ignore the loud voice of fear in my head I was standing on stage in front of over two hundred people. Doing something I never thought I would do again. I hated pubic speaking as a kid and yet here I was a person with massive stage fright. My heart leaped out of my chest and my knees shook. The room was dark and the stage had been lit. If it wasn’t for that I would have fainted, but I did my best. Listened to the voice that said I had this and when finished I went back to my seat.

I was in my first year of university. My whole body shook as I waited for the people to be announced. I knew for certain there was no way I would win. I dipped my head, shame washing over me and then my name was called. To my surprise, people called out my name and everyone stood up. I had won a gold metal for public speaking. I was shocked, even to this day I don’t understand it.

The reason why I told you that story is because I was a shy girl who mumbled and was made fun of. I was the clown and the jab of most jokes. I wasn’t confident and I definitely wasn’t a public speaker. Often, we allow fear to decide who we become and yet, we have the choice in that decision. Only you decide who you become and fear is a tool used to push you back. To stop you from achieving anything, but you decide who you want to be. No one else.

It might seem as though giving up is your only option out there, but that is a clever lie meant to stall you from going after your dreams. You need to understand that fear only does one thing, it stops you from building up your dreams. If you were to look closer, you will realize that fear are false events appearing real.

A lot of the times fears presents itself when we are about to give up and because we allow the past to define us, we let fear. If you want to learn how not to let your past define who you ultimately become, you can read the blog post about it here.

Remember you can ask for help

Not everyone has your interests at heart, we learn that the hard way. That doesn’t mean you have to do all this alone. There are people who are in our lives who will encourage us to keep going forward. There are people who inspire us to keep moving and that can be someone from your past or present. There are also tons of free groups built exactly for that.

Sure, going alone has an interesting appeal especially when we thinking of ourselves as the lone wolf. What most people don’t understand about lone wolves they are vulnerable and weak. A pack makes you stronger and humans need support. It is our built-in function to crave it, and sometimes it is hard doing all this by yourself.

Not having anyone support you. So if you find that you’re struggling, why not search online for support groups or people doing exactly what you’re doing.

It will make the journey far less terrifying.

Giving up is not the solution your problems, if you are stuck and are about to cal, it quit, ask for help. When you do that, you will realize that giving up won’t help you fix your problems. In fact, it will do more damage than good.

Most times, we need to know that we aren’t alone and motivation to keep going. Power of Positivity wrote a blog post with 11 quotes that are sure to motivate you when you feel as though nothing is working out.

What is your one takeaway from this post? Comment below.

KEEP PUSHING

VANESSA

How To Actually Get Things Done

by vanessa | Apr 17, 2019 | Entrepreneurs, Success

How to actually get things done

Make the most of your day by learning how to get things done.

If you want to be productive and kick procrastination to the curb then in this blog post I will show you how to get things done. Getting things done isn’t easy, we struggle with it to a certain extent. There’s always something else that we need to do or a distraction that stops us from getting things done. Whatever the reason is it is hard to be productive these days. We all want to be productive and most of us struggle to actually do that.

It’s not particularly our fault, life is hectic. Time flies by far too quickly and often we’re a jumble of wires, trying to figure life out. There’s no time to do what we love and that is the problem. I have friends who have hectic schedules, they often find it hard to do anything when they have free time. Most of us don’t have the time or don’t know to use it wisely, I’m not an expert, but I was a major procrastinator.

I still struggle with it. I didn’t hit the lottery and all of sudden everything fell into place, some days are hard, others are easier. I just know how to work the system

and that is because of trial and error. I know what works and what doesn’t. All because I attempted to do the impossible, to seek something outside of myself. The great thing is if you want a checklist of all these steps, there’s a freebie down below.

Schedule your day, the night before

Stop wasting time, an easy way to get things done is to schedule your day, the night before. This is by one of the easiest ways to become more productive and get things done. This way, you make progress because as soon as you wake up you can concentrate on the things that matter.

We waste more time thinking about what we have to do than we actually doing it. If you don’t want to do that, you need to write a short list of all the

activities you have to do. You can use different productivity tools for you do that from eating a frog to a simple to-do list. That is all it takes to get things done.

As complicated as it is, it really isn’t. All you have to do is dedicate at least ten minutes in the evening to write down what you need to do the next day. A quick suggestion is don’t try to add too many items to your to-do list. One of the worst things is to have a 25 item to-do list and barely make it half way down. There’s a difference between working hard and smart.

Focus on tasks that require immediate action and move from there. Keep it light, baby steps are far important than leaping over boulders.

Wake up, at an godly hour

As hard as it may be, one of the best ways to get a lot of things done is to wake early, when you do that your mind will focus on the task at hand and it is easier to focus on what needs to be done.

Waking up early is one of the hardest things to do, but it’s a lot easier than we think it is. It all comes down to what time you go to bed. I go to bed really early so I can wake up at 4 am every day. Some days when I want to get more done, I actually wake up at 3 am. I have I cracked the code to wake up. You have to want it bad enough that you sacrifice sleep.

Even if you wake up, do a bit of work and go back to sleep for an hour before work or school. You have done far more work than people who wake up later than usual. Successful people wake up early and if you want to be happier, more energetic then you have to wake up early. As hard as it might be, you have to do it so you can move forward in life.

That is your first step. I recommend going to bed at 8 to 10 pm everyday. That way you get at least 6 – 7 hours of sleep. And that is all you really need. Waking up early will help you to get things done, it will give you a edge over a lot of people. When I started waking up early, that helped me with procrastination and I started doing more and getting things done in time.

This is a productivity hack and if you are interested in knowing more productivity hacks to help you get things done, you can find the blog post I wrote about it here.

Block out the noise

To be in the zone, I use earphones or headphones. I tend to write more or concentrate for longer periods when I do that. There’s so much distraction out there that it is easier for you to lose your focus listening to someone talking on the phone or a dog barking.

There are studies that suggest, productivity actually increases when you’re listening to music using headphones. I definitely think you should try it out and see what happens.

If you want to get things done, you need to block out the noise so that you can be more productive. There are many ways you can block the noise, you could listen to motivational clips or music. Blocking out the noise is one of the best ways to help you get things done. When you focus more on what you are doing rather than all the things you have to do this pushes you.

Eat the frog

Start with the hardest task first early on. I usually write when I wake up because it requires the most brain power. Sometimes I don’t write early in the morning and I realize it’s a lot harder for me to complete this task during the day. Eating the frog helps you focus on completing tasks that require more time or more brain power.

This is why it is important to wake up early. Our bodies are more energetic the less time we spend in bed. You should actually test it out and you’ll find out that you can complete hard tasks early in the morning without breaking a sweat. Not saying that it’s easy, but doing this early in the morning, does help you out in the end. What normally would have taken hours to complete or days because of procrastination you can do it in a few hours early in the morning.

In the first thing in the morning, start with your hardest task, whatever it might be and focus on finishing it. Brian Tracy wrote an interesting blog post about Eating the frog as a way to manage time, if you want to know more about it, you can read more about it here.

Take breaks

You have to take breaks, it’s human nature to do so. Perfection and productivity depend on taking breaks, the more breaks you take, the more you get done. The length of your breaks can be a few minutes or even one hour in between your work.

You have to pace yourself and it’s alright to take breaks. Most of us believe that in order to be successful, it requires us to work like machines. But even laptops overheat and need to cool down. What more the human brain. You can’t concentrate if you don’t take time off. A lot of successful people take power naps and that helps them focus on the task at hand.

Free Get Things Done Checklist

Visualize what you want to achieve

If you want to make progress, one of the best ways to do that is to visualize what you want to achieve. Studies show that people who visualize practicing end up being more successful than those who don’t. Visualize everything you want to do during the day, you can start doing this early in the morning and think about it throughout your day. You’d be amazed at how much you’ll achieve if you do this. It will also help with procrastination and concentrating.

What is you main key takeaway from this blog? Comment below, would love to know what you think.

Keep Pushing

Vanessa

Why You Should Find Your Purpose

by vanessa | Apr 3, 2019 | motivation, Success

Why You should find your purpose

Follow your purpose, you’ll be surprised where it will take you

Finding your purpose has become a controversial topic, one that people utter in disbelief or is seen as taboo. There are two camps of people; one that follows the narrow and straight path, and the other that chooses to go on a different journey. The latter are seen as mavericks, the weirdos of society unless you are Tony Robbins, Oprah Winfreys, Marie Forleos, Zendayas, Roger Federers, and the list goes on.

Success seems to be reserved for the successful. Stories of the underdog rising to the top and building a millionaire dollar empire while working at home inspire us. They always inspire us because that is what success stories were designed for. Yet, many of us go back to our lives and we forget what we read prior. We forget that nothing remains the same.

That is why finding your purpose is controversial. There are gurus that say you shouldn’t and in a way they make sense. Finding your purpose and going for it requires patience and determination. The road is a hard one, full of potholes, headaches, and pains that will definitely make you question everything. There are days when you’ll be broke, sleeping on your sister’s couch and people will definitely tell you that you are crazy.

It is a lonely road and that is why most gurus tell you to not go down the hard route but choose something safer. That is because not everyone can handle following their purpose or passion. Most don’t want to go through the hurdles, you have to jump over so you can find your pot of gold or three-leafed clovers.

Despite the heartache that comes from following your purpose, I still believe you should.

Doing something you love will make you happier

There are a lot of people that believe happiness is a result of success and this can’t be further from the truth. Even if you have a great job with awesome benefits, but still feel aimless then there’s no point. As kids, were made to believe that high-paying jobs will give us the life we want. If that’s the case then why are so many people unhappy. If we look at the greats, despite all their problems, they were happy when they were following their purpose.

They had financial issues, marital problems and many died far too young, but they created an impact doing what they loved. The big difference between then and now is that you don’t have to be a starving entrepreneur or artist to make it.

One of the keys to happiness is doing what you love and not chasing the money trail. Money does not make you happy in spite of what people say. You could have all the money in the world and still feel empty. This has been proven time again, money isn’t the key to happiness, but living a purposeful life is. I wrote a post about how following your passions will make you a whole lot happier, you can check it out here.

Your story will help people

Since I was ten years old, I have believed that everything happens for reason. Maybe, the reason why I believed such a thing at a young age was because of a

Lindsay Lohan movie I watched. I started realizing that life was made of small and big moments that change the course of our lives. These small moments teach us pivotal lessons that prepare us for the bigger moments. It takes time for us to realize that and once it does, it changes the way we look at life. The first real death experience I had was when I was eight years old and I got into an accident.

It changed the way I looked at life. At first, I thought I wasn’t special, but the people around me told me otherwise. They told me I nearly died and for the longest time, I wondered why I didn’t die. I could have simply died and that would have been the end of it. The older I got the more pain I experienced from all areas in my life. I made friends with the wrong people, lost my self-worth a couple of times, became suicidal and I was aimless. I knew what I wanted, but I didn’t think I deserved to go for it.

Despite believing that everything happens for reason, I refused to believe that I had survived this long for a reason. In all honesty, sometimes we believe that there’s nothing special about us. But our stories can change someone’s life in more ways than one. I wish I knew someone who had gone through what I had because that little girl believed she was worthless needed to know they weren’t alone. Often, that is why we need to tell our stories to believe that we were not alone in this journey. We all are special because of the way we can impact people’s lives.

You never know the impact your story can have on people who’re going through what you went through.

You deserve to try it out

Everyone has dreams, whether it is big or small. The unfortunate thing is most of us never follow them. Too afraid that we’ll fail or we’re not worthy of going for it. I once watched a video of Will Smith and he spoke about how many believe that success is esoteric. At that time I wasn’t sure what he meant, but now I understand. There’s this fear that we are not good enough to be successful or talented enough to achieve anything.

I can point a dozen people who sucked at things at first. Take Tom Cruise for example, one of the first ever movies he did, he couldn’t act. The movie was too painful to watch that I wished it would die a quick death. Granted, very few people remember that movie. Even though Tom Cruise failed, no one remembers that. He became an icon due to hard work and perseverance.

Peter Voogd, a serial entrepreneur lost purpose and was bankrupt before he even started. A few years later he came back with an inspiring story of how he doubled his income in six months. There are hundreds of stories out there of people who weren’t at their best when they started their journeys. And that is the point that we often forget. It isn’t about how many times you fail, but rather about what you do after. If you don’t go after your dreams then you will always wonder what if.

I believe you never know where something will take you unless you give it a chance and that is the same concept here. You need to find your purpose, for your sanity and if you don’t you’ll always live a life of regret.

It is better to fail than to regret never going after something because you were too afraid of what might happen.

What is your main takeaway from this post and what do you believe is your purpose? Write your comment below? Would love to know your thoughts

KEEP P USHING

VANESSA