As a blogging mentor I see many bloggers who dream big but fear taking the first small, necessary, routine steps toward the dream.
Most wish to circle the globe as a professional blogger as I do.
Some envision themselves sipping banana shakes on the beaches of Fiji, balling out in Bali or even spending a month in a posh London neighborhood as I am now.
Dreaming big edges you outside of your comfort zone.
This is a good thing.
However, when I advise bloggers to invest money on a domain and hosting as the first step to be taken seriously, the majority deeply fear spending $150-$200 per year on this critical initial blogging investment.
If you cannot do routine, relatively easy things like investing a few hundred dollars for 365 days you are light years away from the more highly uncomfortable, challenging steps necessary in order to actually become a pro blogger.
Do you think you can take the blogging steps necessary to circle the globe as a professional blogger if you anchor yourself with the deep fear of losing $200 over an entire year?
How can you be generous, patient, persistent and trusting if you doubt that a $200 investment over the next 12 months will yield strong returns as far as laying a rock solid foundation for your blog and blogging business?
Before attempting the dramatic quantum leap of circling the globe as a professional blogger it makes far more sense to conquer your fear of losing 200 clams over the course of 12 months.
After blogging for the past 15 years I can assure you that far deeper, more powerful fears than losing 200 smackers over a year need to be faced, felt and conquered in order to become a globetrotting, professional blogger.
Supercars in London
The neighborhood where I am house sitting for the month in London serves as home to Roman Abramovch, Lakshmi Mittal and the Sultan of Brunei
Billionaires dot the area, gobbling up some of the most expensive real estate in the world.
The neighbor across the street had a $3 million Bugatti Chiron delivered a few days ago.
I snapped a picture of that car and used it as the featured image for this post.
Imagine being a blogger who fears losing $200 for a full year but desperately wants the Bugatti Chiron.
Impossible!
If you fear losing $200 over 12 months on a sound business investment you will have to lose (after earning) $3 million to purchase the Bugatti.
Do you see what I mean?
You need to overcome the fear of spending $200 over 12 months before you overcome the fear of spending $3 million on a hypercar. Baby step your mind through the fear of losing a few hundred bucks invested over a year. The Bugatti is potentially 5, to 10 to 15 years away because you have far more powerful fears to conquer in terms of losing money, wasting time, scaling and various aspects of running a highly successful business to the point of being able to afford a $3 million car.
Be then Become
First, you be the entrepreneur who has enough faith to invest $200 on your blog for the next 12 months.
Eventually, you become the blogger who experiences increasing blogging success.
Taking seemingly insignificant, tiny baby steps positions you to succeed over the long haul. Being a successful entrepreneur before becoming a successful entrepreneur is the natural progression that the “quantum leap” crowd wishes to ignore.
Of course, those who try to make a quantum leap fall flat on their face because overnight success does not exist.
Slow, steady, organic growth meets baby steppers who never cut corners.
The blogger who deeply fears losing 200 bucks but feels prepared to part way with $3 million deludes themselves into believing that you can become a multi-millionaire blogger without being that blogger for a sustained period of time before any readers showed up.
Conquer the fear of losing 200 dollars. Proceed to conquer the fear of working 5 hour blogging days after working your 9-5 job. Overcome the fear of wasting time on your blogging campaign. Continue until you become the blogger who goes pro.
Deluded new bloggers eventually learn that the alleged quantum leap usually involves years of patient baby stepping to lay a granite-like foundation for a successful business.
Stop trying to take quantum leaps.
Be.
Become.
Baby step your way to increasing success.
Always seems a little funny to me as a business owner when I see people who are unwilling to invest in their business but want to go out on their own. If you're afraid of spending money on even a few basic tools for your business, you probably won't make it too far.
100% Don. This are the baby steps of facing little fears; if you cannot take a baby step you surely cannot run the marathon we all run to be thriving business owners.