Have You Tried Everything?

I spent most of the weekend riding a train of thought.

First Stop: Cash flow, Venture capital, Getting a sensible job

I thought on Alexia’s What’s Your Fastest Path to Cash? where she writes on refocusing her energy toward quick cash flow by giving more time to her existing WPChick: WordPress Coaching and Consulting for the Terminally Busy. I also thought on the comments there, where folks talk about getting jobs to keep the cash flowing while they work on their stuff.

And I thought of my negative cash flow adventure that started on March 5, without notice and without welcome, when my husband’s job shifted and left him with a pay cut and a crappy commute….and a new job he likes a heckuvalot, so he’s sticking with it despite the inconveniences.

And I thought: It’s time I became my own venture capitalist, which is how Pam Slim cleverly (and kindly) describes getting a job that funds our work.

I told all this to my husband who said, “Well, wait a minute. Have you’ve tried everything?”

And, come to think on it, I haven’t tried much. I’ve been mostly stuck in my sticky stucknesses!

Next Stop: Quilting, Not quitting, Failing as fast as I can

Then I remembered Seth Godin’s “I Quilt”, where he lists things to do in the last days of a job when there’s nothing to lose because you’re leaving anyway…and how assembling the scraps might change everything. I wasn’t quitting altogether, but that approach could have fine results even so.

It does mean speeding things up, though. And for me, speediness always feels like an imminent crash-and-burn. But I’ve been waiting months to get comfy with my plans and they still scare the hell out of me, so…whatever.

Anyway, Pam says it’s useful to fail fast, and I feel sure that continuing to fail slow will mean going ever slower while I get and keep a job.

But I may not need a job if I can fail fast enough.

Last Stop: Out of time (and my mind) but plenty inspired

Did you hear about the beautiful bit of madness for Issue Zero of 48 HR Magazine?

They announced the magazine’s theme at noon on Friday, collected 1500+ submissions by midday Saturday, and the 60-page magazine was finished by noon on Sunday. It went on sale at MagCloud late on Monday, 1000 copies were sold by lunchtime Wednesday, and readers had magazines in hand as early as noon Thursday. Full cycle, full circle, in less than a week.

And fast. Without fail.

Though not without mistakes. Keeping in the spirit of the speed, it was pushed to the printer without reviewing a paper proof. A few boo-boos surfaced later, so they simply released a corrected edition as version 0.1 and moved the hell on.

True story.

Did that get your brain churning and your heart pumping? It did mine…

Next stop: Transfer station to…?

So here I go again, revving myself up to do I-know-not-what in less time than I need.

And yet, the best things happen when there’s no time to build a worry scenario, no room to wriggle out, and no better way to earn money. It’s how my naked work started, and good times came with that.

While we wait for the next train:

Have you tried everything?

And that’s not a question just for us folks on the edge. You can be standing at the start or smack dab in the middle, and it’s still good for subconscious simmering. No need to chew on it, just…simmer.

Keep in mind that you don’t need to have something new to try something new. Like Alexia, you can start where you are with what you have.

What would that mean for you? Maybe it means you—

• Offer additional services to your current clients for additional billable hours
• Repurpose your blog posts into an ebook, with some new bits to freshen them up
• Read your posts aloud for an audiobook, or have them read aloud for you
• Transform your writings and audio recordings into video
• Translate your writings, audio, and video into English, French, Spanish, Thai, Hindi, et. al.
• Spread your content and ideas throughout a membership program
• Distill your stuff into a short course by email
• Expand it into a workshop
• Make a bunch of things to give away and spread the word

Note: I haven’t tried any of those, but anything’s worth a try when you’re trying everything…

Photo credit: doug_wertman