My Top Secret for Getting People to Care About You & Your Work
Clarity & Confidence in Your Creative Work
This Fall, I’m dishing out a 6-week Instagram Live Training + Blog Post series around the topic of “Finding Clarity & Confidence in Your Creative Work.”
Consider this Marketing 101, but with a focus on connecting with who you are in your work.
This theme will scale each week setting you up to take the next step and thrive going into the upcoming Q4 3-Week Boot Camp. (Saturday, Oct. 29th - Friday, Nov. 18th) 🗓
In this 21-day group coaching workshop, you’ll learn how to Confidently Promote You, Your Work, + Your Value!
Note: Click the image to watch the replay. Continue below to read the blog.
Click to watch the Instagram Live Training Replay
Worry about this before anything else
Do you feel like no one is paying attention to what you’re putting into this world?
I get it, it’s easy to get wrapped up in creating what we think people or an algorithm want to see.
But sadly, I feel most people think the secret to “getting people to care” is all about catering to what the masses want.
Over the past decade of stumbling through my creative career, I’ve learned a few tips and tricks by miserably failing, experimenting, and doing a butt load of research.
While I think it’s important to understand why someone should care about what you do…
I actually feel there’s a more important step most people skip.
Before obsessing about WHY others should care…
Dig deep, look within, and determine WHY you care about what you do.
To me, this is the main secret I feel is the hardest, yet most important step to figuring out.
If we want people to care, first understand a few things from your personal point of view.
5 Questions to Ask Yourself
Here are 5 questions that can reveal why you care about what you do:
Why do you vibe to what you do?
What’s the value you find in who you are as a human/creator?
What’s the value you find in creating your work?
What’s the value you find in sharing your work with the world?
What’s the purpose and fulfillment you want out of your creative pursuits?
I chat with hundreds of creatives each year…
Most of them are 100% skipping this step and obsessively creating for the masses.
I feel society and marketers wire us to chase these sexy external results before doing the hard external work.
We chase vanity metrics like Followers, Subscribers, Shares, Likes, and Comments.
We’re sold that these are the pillars of success convincing you to endlessly feed a forever starving algorithm.
When in reality, you have to define what fulfillment, purpose, and success look like to you in your own lane.
Those 5 questions above were what I present to a recent round of Boot Camp students this past August.
But before I expect others to answer these difficult questions…
I have to first make sure I can answer them myself during the season I’m in.
The answers below are what helped me get back to the basics of tapping into my art identity…
Which then fuels every other aspect of my coaching business and life in general.
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5 Questions revealing why I care
1. Why do I vibe to what I do?
I vibe to what I do because it allows me to truly connect with who I am in my work.
I am 100% myself in what I do and I gain clarity on my identity the more I lose myself in my art.
But I also understand that even though my work is a big part of my identity…
The positive or negative performance of my work on social media doesn’t reflect who I am.
My work doesn’t define my worth.
2. What’s the value I find in who I am as a human/creator?
Over the years, I’ve learned that I can easily fall victim to both the internal critic and the external noise around me.
I have to protect my mind and time—otherwise, I fall into creative, depressed funks.
I become an unstoppable force radiating positivity, productivity, and confidence when I’m:
Making self-care a high priority.
Conscious about what I consume.
Mindful of who I surround myself with.
Aware of what I have on my plate.
Leveraging constraints and creating boundaries (for myself and others).
These aren’t areas of overnight mastery. I’ve slowly nurtured each area becoming 1% each day, week month, and year over time.
When these are all clicking in a season, I’m in a dialed-in position to clearly know:
What I want and why.
Who I want to become and why.
How I’m going to make it happen.
What’s a priority vs. what’s a distraction.
What resources I need to reach the target(s).
3. What’s the value I find in creating my work?
I’ve learned that I don’t find a lot of joy when I’m creating for other people—hence why I killed the freelance side of things back in late 2018.
During this specific season…
I create for the lost past version of me who was isolated, stuck, depressed, and clueless on how to make moves with my work.
I create for the present version of myself navigating this chapter of life.
I create to learn more about who I am and who I’m becoming within my process.
I’m currently growing alongside my craft and evolving into a better version of myself when I’m creating from my soul…
I can’t tap into this growth when I’m obsessively creating what I think algorithms, trends, and people want to see.
4. What’s the value I find in sharing my work with the world?
I’m a believer in sharing and growing in public—it holds me accountable and is actually therapeutic for owning and working through my shit.
I also believe that I can provide a lot of value by sharing my story, wins + defeats…
Along with tips I’ve learned over the years to build a “successful” creative business.
5. What’s the purpose and fulfillment I want out of my creative pursuits?
I feel art + creativity are the keys to my happiness.
When I’m creating and challenging myself, I’m my best and most fulfilled self.
It puts me in a position to wake up each day:
With a savage mindset rooted in purposeful play.
Stoked to have powerful conversations with creatives.
Hungry to make killer pieces of content, resources, and services to help creatives bet big on themselves.
It also gets me hyped to:
Make time to work on my art in the evenings and downtime in between my coaching.
Inspire + motivate anyone who interacted with me or my work.
Push my comfort zone + take calculated, and terrifying, risks.
This is what keeps me fueled to show up and make my creative dream a non-negotiable.
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To summarize…
Before obsessively focusing on why someone else should care about what we create and share…
I think we gotta first look in the mirror and understand why that person staring back at you cares.
Those 5 questions above can help you:
Catch a pulse of who you are at your core.
Understand how it all overlaps with your creative identity.
Create work that you truly vibe to.
Reveal the value you can uniquely provide.
Be more confident in your craft this season.
Simply reiterated…
Connect with what you do before expecting others to connect with it.
Be selfish to harness and nurture your gift so you can selflessly give it away.
This is my #1 secret for getting people to care about your work.
The more you understand why you care and the value you find in doing what you do…
You set the tone for why others will care over time.
Keep showing, keep putting in the work, and keep creating—YOU GOT THIS! ✌🏻🍕
Want to work together? 🤝
Consider learning more below about how to join an upcoming 3-Week Boot Camp. 👇🏻
JOIN THE BOOT CAMP WAITLIST
The Side Hustler's Boot Camps are quarterly 3-Week Group Coaching Workshops that provide you a year’s worth of measurable growth, support, and accountability…
Or they’re available as one-off sessions to tackle the biggest struggles in your creative pursuits.
This is for any creator, freelancer, or aspiring entrepreneur who wants to build their brand/biz creating work they love.
Expect challenging exercises, a private community, up to 3 weekly live calls, and more.
Learn More and Join the Waitlist for updates + 1st dibs at enrollment.
