How Does the Online Idea Party Work?
You have a dream or a wish, and an obstacle to getting there. (If you don’t think you know your wish, work through my kick-starter and read this post. To learn why you must put logic aside to find your dream, read the following.)
The online Idea Party is here to help you – and the other fellow party goers – with your wishes and obstacles.
Voices from Success Teams and Idea Parties:
Having a team to report to and hearing what everybody did each week is very exciting. It’s kept me moving all year. In the past I made some good starts on my own, but found, every time, when the energy ran out, I ran out. Now it doesn’t run out.
Jade G.
Children’s Playroom Therapist, New York Hospital
I would do a painting a year, a sketch a year. If it was only me I know I would never do it. Having to tell you makes all the difference. It’s crazy why I didn’t do this years ago, it’s so easy all of a sudden.
Caroline R. Personnel Executive, Macy’s Dept Store
Post Your Wish and Your Obstacle Here!
And help your team mates out when you can. Use the Reply link to help, the form below the comments to add your own Wish and Obstacle.
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I’m in dire need to brainstorm and find out what I need to do for a living after quitting my day j-o-b… I sat down and thought about what I would do if I had all the money in the world and realized I love learning and doing new things/new experiences…yes I am a “Scanner”! 🙂
For example, I would travel the world going to all the various seminars, workshops, trade show conferences, film festivals, exhibits that interest me and also take classes locally and learn new things all the time (random things like candle making to Horse Polo playing to dirt bike riding to new language,etc).
Now my question is – how to make money attending these things – I know I don’t want to be the one teaching them (not much in getting up in front of people) but would love to go and learn and meet new walks of life. I thought about being some sort of writer about the seminars, classes I take – but not sure I’d want to do that and how that would really make any money either… what to do.. 🙁
I hope to hear from you all – thanks for the advice/help!
Hi Pam. Have you ever thought about signing up to work for the Examiner? Once you’re approved to write for them, you write for a certain specialty in your area. You could be your town’s “Local Event or Seminar Examiner”. It doesn’t pay very much at all, but it’s something that you can do with little expense and travel time to see if you like it at first. You never know, you may really like it, and it could lead you into something else. The Examiner’s website gets a lot of traffic and exposure. Here is their site: http://www.examiner.com/About_Examiner
Good idea – I will look into it! Thanks Molly!
You could fun your interest in attending workshops with different craft-toy-service items as you become interested in them that you’d sell to the participants while being a participant.
Here’s an example:
My friend Michael, used to bring along the materials to hand make an original craft toy that nobody had ever seen before to workshops, teaching everyone how to play with them and selling all of the workshop participants a “kit” of how to make the thing – all during the workshop that he was attending.
At this idea party, you could ask people to give you ideas. These items need to be:
Small, light in weight, original and interesting, fun to learn and use, reflect your own quirky interests. So we’d need a list of those things that interest you – (your “Touch-Stones” as Barbara Sher would say.)
Whatever your interests would be, ideas would come up with a little product that people can buy from you to commemorate having met you.
I have seen a cool hairbrush that worked for doing fun long hair styles… An interesting art pen template that made fun pieces of art, a unique way of making jewelry, and a thread “dream catcher.” My friend’s product was an original juggling toy, very small and easy to carry and make that was shaped like a badminton birdie, but kicked around like a hackysac.
But by knowing what sort of things you are interested in, perhaps you could find something like this to offer other participants.
hmm.. that sounds interesting, I’ll have to think more about this one!
Thanks!
Pam, you could be a magazine writer – you could pitch all the different things you did to different magazines. Travel pieces… craft magazine might like the candle making… etc. But you said you weren’t sure you wanted to be a writer?
Do you have a skill that could be used freelance? (graphic design or ?) Then you could travel and send your work in from where ever you happened to be…
I tend to lean more towards being a photographer and graphic designer than a writer.. am now looking into doing art designs to license onto consumer products and going to the Surtex tradeshow next month! Not sure if this is a reason to just be able to attend another tradeshow or if this is something I can create a freelance career around.. guess we’ll see!
I always think about being a magazine or website writer about the events/shows I go to and the classes/experiences I have (just learned paddle boarding last weekend and glass fusion art 2 weekends ago!). Just seems so hard to do the detailed work of researching who/where to pitch, etc. 🙂
But maybe that is something I’ll have to just dig in and get to!
Thanks!
If that were my goal, I would study up on reporting and ad copywriting. Both can make decent money, especially copywriting. It’s kind of like a food critic being paid to go to eat in restaurants. You would need decent experience and a portfolio in order to get paid decently, but you could start out on Fiverr.com to get some of it. If you set up an online review site, you might get advertising. Those take a lot of background work to create steady income streams, so take that into account. It’s totally doable, though.
someone else just mentioned Fiver.com.. I’ll have to look into that! I know – it does sound like a lot of background work to do which is why I haven’t gotten motivated to do that sort of thing yet. Thanks for the info!
I feel EXACTLY the same as you – obstacle – earning enough money
I hear ya Sister. I had the same yearnings, so I joined the Peace Corps and taught 3rd grade in Liberia for three years, got paid and travelled the world with 45 days of paid leave a year.
All it takes is One step, and it’s amazing how the other steps materialize as you go.
I have a life I never could have imagined from my arm chair!
Best of all,
WD
Why don’t you become an agent for all the teachers whose classes you admire? I’m sure they’d like to have more bookings and earn more money. An agent for speakers gets at least 25% of the fee they arrange for their client, the teacher.
Hi Barbara –
Thanks for that info.. I had no idea that even existed! That does sound pretty cool/interesting to look into.
I also have just thought about licensing my art (my photography & graphic design stuff) but also started thinking about being the agent to help the artists too. I love looking at beautiful images (art galleries, photos, cool graphics – even motion graphics).. so thought I could maybe make a living looking at all of that all the time and help others out to boot! I hope there is such a thing..going to look into that more as well!
One thing I found out about being a Scanner – you can be really down one day and then the next idea comes along and it perks you back up to having hope and creating more experiences/careers! 🙂 Thanks Barbara – and can’t wait to join your new club!
My Brother gave me your book many years ago and being the undisciplined afraid to start person that I am I skimmed through it and put it on my list of things to do. I recently picked it up again at the free shelf in my local library and am in the process of crying my heart out. Everytime I tell someone about my dreams I always get the same feed back Paulette you want to do too much You have to do stop and decide on one thing, but I can’t. I have a long way to go. I realized I am one of the most creative people I know but I cannot get anything from my head into my hands and I am working at a Call Center. I always thought I was a dilettante and now I realize that I have a Renaissance mind. I also realized that my biggest fear is lack of security and that’s what holds me to a doldrum job in a call center. I want security in my life and I am shooting myself in the foot. I am on my way but I also have a long ways to go. I know that real security comes from me. My BIG goal is to be on my own and have my own home-based business (I want to create soaps and food products from my garden- pesto dried tomatoes and possibly pasta (does my Italian come out?). I also knit, crochet and sew and I have an idea for a book I want to write that incorporates all of my ideas and other people who have influenced me (like my Mother and all my other Mother’s) to create projects out of things most people would throw away like dryer lint for example. I thank you for helping me get started I have a long way to go. p.s. Has anyone ever told you tha you look like Angela Lansbery
I hope you do write a book about how to create things out of dryer lint. I’d love to read it!
Start by setting up a soapmaking station, in your home, make several samples (in your spare time, haha), then take them to flea markets, local festivals, farmer’s markets,church or school holiday boutiques, etc.-to sell. See how your profits go.
Goodluck.
I have told the story to my friends how I once started a book on procrastination…and guess what…punchline…I never finished it. I just discovered your wisdom this week and have now slammed wide the door that I have kept closed for so long…knowing what was just behind it but never really wanting to open the door since it might mean I have to do something about what I find there.
My perfectionism, self-doubt and running in place has provided stress which only reinforces my self-doubt since I am not taking any action…In effect, I have been planning my inaction every day. I really give a great deal of my energy to sitting still. My biggest hurdle is never starting…forget completing. I do find that once I get over the “starting”…I go full force with everything I have. I just question every move too analytically…focused on the worse outcomes with a great deal of negativity.
I have thought of painting (I have a fine art degree – Painting/photography), making web sites (love to learn on the job…just hard to find) and then there are the sciences…love, love, love science…studying how the brain works…why we do what we do…even thought about becoming an art therapist. (In my head…”All the schools are too far away and online colleges are questionable.”)
Oh…if it helps to know…I have taken the Myers-Briggs several times over the years and I always end up as an INTJ. So, if I am a scanner (and I am, of course) and INTJ’s like constant work that is stimulating and tend to analyze everything before trusting its validity…well…here I am underachieving at an alarming rate. (I don’t mean to generalize the traits of an INTJ…we are all so different.)
I haven’t read any of your books yet. I plan to…??? Yes, I tell myself that. I have to put it on my list. I just need to start making lists…not too many…just get started. I think I will start with Live the Life You Love.
Thanks for listening…and thank you for being the light that brings life to us all.
I just saw the idea party video and noticed your mention of http://www.galeazza.com – here’s what I’ve been trying, but am burned out.:
I Have half of a historic Mark Twain type Mississippi River town in SW Wisconsin USA very beautiful area – 100 person town – I have 4 1880’s – 1901 business buildings with upstairs residences – closed down & need various stages of rennovation, I’ve been working on it for about 10 years, but the locals think historic buildings should be torn down and nice doublewide trailerhouses brought in. 2 great State parks 10 miles each direction. My background is Creativity & Future Studies & most of the trades, but I’m 68 and burned out.
I have about 3,000 great books there on many concievable subjects, plus boats, ultralights, etc. I also have backgrounds on Learning from other Cultures & the Anthropology of Play.
Would you happen to know of people who might be interested in being involved?
Thanks, Greg Sedbrook 608 732 8243
PS – links – http://wigrr.com/ I’m in Glen Haven – South of Prairie Du Chien and this “Zen in the art of Motorcycle Maintainence” sort of film retracing the discovery of the Mississippi by Joliet & Marquette is to come out mid April http://www.waterwalkthemovie.com/
Something that might be of interest interculturally – (about 80 min long)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piF5ikeveHA
I borrowed “Refuse To Choose” from the library, and before I was done reading it, I had ordered my own copy. It’s a book that has made it to my “If I’m on a Desert Island…” list. I alternated between jumping in exhilaration (on the inside, of course) that finally there was an explanation for who and how I am, and crying in relief that I’m not only not the only one, but someone understands and has worked to provide me with guidance toward achieving my maximum potential!
I read it cover-to-cover, but in bits and pieces over several weeks (highly unusual for me) because there was much to think about, and I gave each point its due. I had created a sort of My Wishes book already, but it was in a lined journal, and I really think the lines are a detriment. I won’t stop using that one, but I really like that the Scanner Daybook has unlined paper. I think it helps tremendously not to feel hemmed in by lines, forced to write left to right horizontally across a page, etc. I created a book cover for my Daybook — it’s bright yellow with bumblebees all over it, to remind me that it’s OK to sample something until I’m done with it, until it’s enough for me, no matter what anyone else thinks!
I read an article sometime, somewhere. It was about kids with ADD or ADHD, I can’t remember which. What I do remember is that one of the kids described her world as zipping by her in every direction, every day, every moment of every day, and she felt compelled to work to keep up with it so that she didn’t miss anything at all. Once she was on medication, her world slowed down, and she was able to take things one at a time and enjoy them. The frenetic pace was gone. She was much, much happier. That article not only gave me an insight to people with attention disorders, but now, after reading “Refuse to Choose,” I feel much the same way that person described. Maybe not to that scale, of course, but my “undiagnosed” Scanner-ness is the ADD, and this book and the Daybook are my medication. I’ve only filled out a couple of pages, but I felt almost immediate peace when I did. All of a sudden, I didn’t have to work to remember those few awesome ideas along with all the other awesome ideas that pop into my head in any given day or week. I had them on paper. They were safe, and I had more room in my head for the ones I haven’t yet entrusted to my Daybook. Because there’s more room, they aren’t bumping around quite so fast.
My next step is to go back and re-read the book again, cover-to-cover, taking notes, paying more attention to some of the details, thinking more about how to apply it to my daily life. Just before reading “Refuse to Choose,” I had a revelation. For years, I’ve struggled to keep a book of inspirational quotes. I’d write something down, then get disinterested. I recently realized that I was keeping my quotations book based on the rules I *thought* I had to follow for such a book: quotes from Shakespeare and the Bible, lines from classic literature, etc. Well, I don’t especially enjoy Shakespeare, I don’t read classic literature, and I keep track of favorite biblical passages in my Bible. All of a sudden, it hit me one morning. This is MY book. I can write anything in it that I want to. No one else has to see it, and if it comes from a romance novel, a TV show, or a billboard, if it’s meaningful to me, then it’s worth putting in my book. I don’t know why it took me so long to come to that realization, but I’ve felt a little freer since then. And “Refuse to Choose” only helps. It’s good to know I’m not really a procrastinator. Well, maybe I am a little bit, but it’s not necessarily laziness behind the procrastination, it’s mostly not knowing what to do so I don’t do anything at all.
I’m also quite in love with the multiple binder method. I can’t believe something so simple never occurred to me! But I’m an internet browser, following link after link to read so many interesting things! My bookmark menu is quite extensive. But, believe it or not (and you probably do believe it), I’ve got a collection of binders, folders, tablets, and organizers to fill an office and about three four-drawer filing cabinets. I’m both a collector (of many things, information being one of them) and an organizer by nature, and the binder method of storing information is absolutely perfect! Better than filing crates, boxes, cabinets, etc. I’ve started printing the articles I find online rather than bookmarking them, so I can begin filling my binders. I’m thinking that looking at the subjects I collect will help me on my search to find what it is I’m supposed to be doing.
The idea of a Good Enough Job is probably one of the greatest ideas. Ever! It explains why I’m fairly satisfied wherever I work, and my scanner-ness explains why I get bored so quickly. I’m tinkering with the idea of trying to be a professional temp worker — using the skills I strongest at, but getting out before it goes all boring and tedious. Right now, as I look for “real” employment, I work as a call center person from home. I thought I’d hate it, but it’s not that bad. But after essentially “getting permission,” actually being encouraged to seek out a Good Enough Job, I think I heard some inner shackles clinking as they were being released. I’d never before thought of it that way. I’d always dreaded finding a job because it wasn’t my Grand Passion. But now I know that I have many Grand Passions, and choosing one is not the right course for me. Having a Good Enough Job is not settling, it is freeing yourself from the worries of everyday living while enabling you to seek out, act upon, and immerse yourself in however many Grand Passions you have today. Being taught that new perspective has opened my way of thinking about job searching. I’m really thinking that if I could make a living at temp work, that’s what I’d like to do. But if that doesn’t work out, I can always take a full-time job, love it for a couple of months, then start looking for those aliens that abduct people who don’t complete assignments by self-imposed deadlines! ;^)
Sorry this is so long. I’m just really excited about what I’ve read, what I’m about to re-read, and the discoveries within myself that I’m beginning to make, that I had to share before I lost it all in the jumble of stuff that’s still in my head. Thanks for “listening.”
Hmmm a professional Temp worker – I like that! I was thinking about looking into doing temp work as well but always thought that it would just be a ‘quick fix’ to get some money coming in while I work on my main personal goals/passions – but if I can find enough temp jobs around that I would like doing using skills I like using (coordinating projects, graphic design, etc).. then it could be awesome! I get so bored with the same old ‘day job’ – been where I’m at for 10 years now and need out. So this may be a good way to change it up but also be a bit ‘safe’! Good luck to you! And so nice to know that there are so many other scanners out there like me! 😉
Wish: To see people’s relationships with God, others, themselves and creation restored as a direct result of my mentoring and teaching and loving them through experiential and classical education.
Obstacles:
1. I don’t know exactly in which setting(s) I could do this and be happy as an outdoor-loving, idea-loving, feel-at-home-in-CA-or-ME, Scanner.
2. I thus don’t know what qualifications (e.g. degrees, experience) I need to get into that situation.
3. I am in a graduate program that actively pushes students to pursue fame through research, and this is tempting to follow.
When is Barbara’s Club starting?
The launch party will be on April 28, from 2 to 330pm ET on the telephone and Twitter. Details are coming via my newsletter (including my earnest struggles to explain what it will be 🙂
IF YOU’RE NOT ON MY MAILING LIST, YOU REALLY SHOULD GET ON IT. (go to http://www.geniuspress.com and you’ll see a place to sign up on that page. I’m giving away loads of really good gifts, including free membership in the special part called ‘Hanging Out With Barbara Sher’ but you’ll only get the important info if you receive these newsletters I’m staying up all night to send you. 🙂
Signed up for newsletter and Barbara’s Club info. When should I expect to hear more?
Hi there!
I am an actress and Masters Broadcast Journalism student at the University of Southern California. My name is Meryl Hawk. Meryl, like Meryl Streep and Hawk, like the bird 🙂
WISH: I want to shoot a feature film this year, which I will write (and have already started writing) along with a friend of mine from New York University – She also lives in LA. I will act in the film as well as co-produce. I would like the film to be so compelling story and character-wise, that it gets some “buzz” around LA.
OBSTACLES: I am short a GREAT producer, and cinematographer. I also would like to find a Canon 5D, tripod, lights and sound equipment for the shoot. As well as a few special effects – squibs, explosions and blood packs. I realize there is a lot I need to get going here but I have a few skills I can offer in return for what you lend me…
WHAT I HAVE TO OFFER IN RETURN FOR YOUR HELP: I will act in projects at no charge, do journalism – a story on you and what you do: print, broadcast or multimedia.
All of my journalism projects are up at http://www.merylhawk.com
All of my acting work is up at http://www.merylhawkonline.com
Thanks!