4 Ways to Turn Personal Experiences Into Profit Centers

While it could be argued that every business is influenced and informed by our personal experiences, a great deal of opportunity goes unused when we fail to see the potential of putting that experience to work.

Personal experience lends itself to all sorts of enterprises. Here are some things to keep in mind to discover those hidden opportunities.

° Value your own experience. Very often the things that are easy and effortless for us are overlooked if we assume thata what we can do everyone can do.

That’s almost never true. Your special set of talents, skills and life experiences are a one-of-a-kind package.

Writer Carolyn See says, “I hope I’m wrong, but I imagine about 90 percent of the human race is snoozing along, just going through the motions.” Staying awake for the journey is important if we are to find gold in our lives.

° Find a better way. Doris Drucker, the wife of management guru Peter Drucker, found a new opportunity herself this way. She writes, “For years my role as the wife of a professional speaker was to sit in the last row of an auditorium and shout, ‘Louder!’ whenever my husband’s voice dropped. I decided that there had to be a better feedback device and if there wasn’t I was going to invent one. Then I decided, at the age of 80, that I would start a business and sell it.”

Solving a common problem or simply finding a more effective way of doing something has been the start of many a successful business.

° Tell your story. Benjamin Franklin said we should write something worth reading of live something worth writing. Personal experiences can be the basis for both autobiography and how-to books.

Workshops, seminars and consulting are other ways of making your story pay. You need to live it first, of course.

° Pay it forward. Several years ago, Kevin Spacey was in a movie with that title. Apparently the message of passing along our good to others took root.

Spacey started a Web site called Triggerstreet to create opportunities for the next generation of screenwriters. Spacey said he realized that his considerable success was the result of others believing in him before he believed in himself. Now he wants to pass that gift along.

Your experience could be utilized through teaching or mentoring those coming along behind you.

When it’s time to plan a new profit center, take a fresh look at your own life. What do you have to share that could make other people’s lives richer, happier, healthier or smoother in some way?

You may be sitting on a gold mind, you know. As Jack Lessinger reminds us, “Build something, help something, save something. The possibilities are endless.

 

 

Stumped for a Business Idea? Try This

There seems to be a trend going on in my e-mail these days. I keep getting messages from folks saying they know they want to be self-employed but are totally stumped about what to do.

I understand the frustration. There was a big gap between the moment I realized I wanted to be self-employed and the time I actually knew what I wanted to start.

It wouldn’t have taken me so long to figure things out if I had realized that getting good ideas is nothing more than an exercise in creativity.

One of the best starting points is to ask this simple question: Who has a problem I know how to solve?

You might come up with an initial answer such as, “Lots of people don’t have enough time to do everything they want or need to do.”

Start a list of possible solutions based on what you can offer. It might go something like this:

° I love to run errands and know my way around the city.

° I know how to download music on an iPod.

° I know how to save money on car repairs and groceries.

° I can organize a messy office in no time flat.

° I love putting together itineraries for special interest trips.

° I love helping seniors who aren’t able to do things for themselves.

Once you’ve got a list started, decide which idea sounds like the most fun for you. (Yes, fun comes first.)  Then start thinking about the potential clients for such a service.

Let’s say you choose downloading iPods.

Who could use such a service?  (The answer is “lots of people”!)

The next questions are:

° How can I connect with the folks who need this service?

° How do I price my service?

° Could I get some free publicity for this?

° Would it hold my interest long enough to make it a viable profit center?

° Would it be fun to do even as a short term profit center?

Asking and answering better questions is the way to develop tiny seeds of an idea. Alas, many people handle ideas with excuses and dead end statements such as, “If that was really such a good idea I’m sure someone else would have thought of it.”

Greet your ideas with enthusiastic questions and you’ll find yourself with a promising enterprise waiting to be born. As Hope Wallis pointed out, “Opportunities are like pole beans. You have to keep picking them so more can grow.”

 

 

8 Ways to Wake Up Your Curiosity

“The cure for boredom is curiosity,” mused Dorothy Parker. “There is no cure for curiosity.” If you’d like to catch this virus, here are a few resources and idea starters (which only have value when investigated further).

° Get lost on purpose. I bet you know the shortest, fastest route to the places you go on a regular basis. Right?  That may be expedient, but it doesn’t generate much curiosity.

Give yourself an hour or two and head in a direction you’ve not gone before. Explore a new neighborhood in your hometown. Ride a city bus to the end of the line.

° Locate kindred spirits. If you’re exploring a new subject, chances are good that you’re not alone in your interest.

Visit the reference section of your library and check out Gale’s Encyclopedia of Associations to see what organizations exist that share your interest.

Look for conferences and seminars that bring together others who can expand  your curiosity. Encounters with real humans can enhance your learning experience in ways that research alone can’t.

° Immerse, don’t dabble. Pick one or two projects that you’re willing to explore as fully as possible instead of dozens of little toe dippers. You could set an exploration up as a 90-Day Project, or make it an on-going, regular study.

° Revisit a lost love. Many of us have abandoned an activity that once brought us great joy.

If you used to be a voracious Scrabble player, for instance, get a game going and see if it’s still a fit for you. Sometimes we outgrow a passion, but sometimes we realize we’ve just neglected it.

° Be a klutz. Many of us learned early on that it wasn’t okay to make mistakes. That, of course, is the biggest mistake of all.

So pick an activity that you know you’ll do clumsily and do it anyway. Even better, do it in public, with witnesses. Don’t scold yourself afterwards.

° Uncover a new curiosity. Pay a visit to eHow and sample some of their videos on subjects from the sublime to the amusing.

You could learn how to Change Water in a Fish Tank, Travel the World Cheap, Make Custom iPhone Ringtones—or 150,000 other subjects.

You’re bound to find something you didn’t even know you wanted to know.

° Build a list of Firsts. On purpose, do something at least once a week that you’ve never done before.

Try a new food, get active in social media, visit a neighbor you’ve never met, rent a classic movie that was made before you were born.

Keep a list and amaze yourself with all the new activities and new people you encounter before the year is over.

° Listen to a deep thinker. Although they’ve been around since 1984, the wonderful TED Talks are just gaining popular attention.

In case you aren’t familiar with this wonderful program, pay them a visit and listen to Sir Ken Robinson or Benjamin Zucker or Elizabeth Gilbert or any one of the dozens of innovative speakers they’ve recorded and generously share with us.

 

Business Building Help From Your Public Library

Public libraries have been with me every step of the way in my entrepreneurial journey.

I remember visiting the tiny Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, library when I was first dreaming about starting a business. Compared with today, the offerings for would-be entrepreneurs were pretty skinny, but reading biographies of several pioneering women entrepreneurs inspired me enormously.

In every place I’ve lived, I’ve gotten my library card before I got my driver’s license. So it always comes as a surprise to me when I talk to a would-be or struggling entrepreneur and discover that they don’t tap into the treasure trove that’s waiting for them.

If you haven’t visited a library for a while or you always head to the same section, check out all the ways a library can help you build your business.

° Nonfiction titles exist on every aspect of starting and running a business. Besides personal accounts and biographies, how-to books abound.

Want to know what all the fuss about branding is? Thinking about selling articles to magazines? Want to tap into new trends? There’s a good chance that somebody has done you the favor of writing about it.

° Get inspired with a novel. Mysteries, especially, often feature entrepreneurial characters in leading roles. Often these entrepreneurs are amateur detectives as well.

You can learn a lot—almost accidentally—about antiquarian book selling from John Dunning or catering from Diane Mott Davidson while solving a murder or two.

° Make friends with a reference librarian. I am certain that if they didn’t love books so much, many of the folks running the library reference desk would be private detectives. They love tracking things down—the harder the better.

Got an idea for a research project? Ask the reference librarian to show you the  grant directories. Want to be a public speaker? Inquire about Gale’s Encyclopedia of Associations to get ideas. Need statistics for a presentation? The reference desk is a great place to start your search.

° Make drive time more valuable. My library has an entire room devoted to audio books. Many wonderful fiction and nonfiction titles are available on CD and make fine companions for road trips or while running errands.

As Minnesota Public Radio used to remind me, “Get out of your car smarter than you got in.”

° Visit a new universe. Browse in a section you don’t normally explore. Check out some magazines that you’ve never read before.

This is what Seth Godin calls “zooming” which he defines as “stretching your limits without threatening your foundation.”

° Attend a talk. If you have access to a fairly large library, chances are they offer free programs as part of their community service. My library often features authors talking about their writing careers as well as programs on everything from finding your ancestors to travel talks.

° Create an in-depth research project. Build a passion into expertise by learning everything you can about a subject. Don’t just dabble; immerse.

Start with your library’s collection and see how far it can take you, but don’t stop there. Enlist the reference librarian to help you uncover addition information that you haven’t found on your own.

Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borge once mused, “I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.” Fortunately, you don’t have to wait until you get there to experience the pleasure a library can bring.

 

Do Talk to Strangers

It’s a new month which means it’s time for a new theme, but I decided to do something a little different this month. The official theme is Potpourri and I’ll be sharing whatever catches my fancy.

Here’s a piece I wrote a while back after someone asked me how I go about opening a conversation with strangers.

Author Bill Bryson talks about being on a train and thinking about fellow travel writer Paul Theroux writing about the fascinating conversations he has with strangers. This seemed to perplex Bryson because he found it difficult to strike up conversations with traveling Brits. That got me thinking about a short conversation with an enthusiastic traveler who confessed that he found it difficult to talk to strangers and wondered how I did it.

Since my Do Talk To Strangers Policy is a vital component of traveling—and being entrepreneurial—I started to consider how I actually go about it. I realized that some of it is purely intuitive.

For instance, when a stranger plunks down next to me on an airplane, I take a breath, take a look and see if I’m moved to start a conversation. Most of the time I get it right. Once in a while, I know  from my opening question that my seatmate is inclined toward solitude and I stop there.

Whether you’re standing in line at the post office or waiting for a train, here are a few ideas to help you uncover the fascinating folks around you.

° Make it a game. Decide ahead of time that you want to find an interesting story or inspiring stranger. I have been on long flights that seemed to pass in a moment  because I had landed next to a great storyteller. I consider that a fine compensation for the annoyances of contemporary travel.

° Don’t wait. Instigate. Be willing to be the one who takes the first step. A friendly smile is a good way to test the water. If it’s not reciprocated, move on.

° Look for common ground. I often open a conversation with a compliment or observation about something the stranger is wearing or carrying or something that’s happening around us.

When I hopped into a London taxi that was covered in promotional material for the Rolling Stones, I suspected I had a fascinating chat ahead of me. And I did. I learned that my driver was the only cab in the city promoting the Stones, that he earned an extra £750 a year by putting advertising on his cab, and that he’d once advertised for the South African Tourist Board and got a free trip to that country as a bonus. He was hoping he might get tickets to a Stones concert this time around.

° Be politely curious. Our reluctance to talk to strangers may be caused by thinking it’s about us. Wrong. It’s about them. Yes, you might be subjected to a tedious story now and then, but it’s worth the risk.

One of my most memorable conversations was with a young man who was a linguistic professor who spoke seven languages. When I learned that, I asked him the best way to learn a language and his reply was, “Be a kid.” I laughed and asked, “What’s the second best ?”

The answer to that question—and many more—kept us chatting from Minneapolis to Los Angeles. I learned a lot and enjoyed his willingness to share his linguistic passion.

Those are the moments that keep me talking to strangers who unknowingly enrich my life.  And like everything else, it gets easier with practice.

 

Making a Beautiful Difference

When Nate Berkus paid a visit to Oprah at her home in Montecito, CA, she showed him (and us) her field of blooming lavender. It was glorious and  occupied at least an acre of her property. It was obvious that Oprah enjoyed sharing this favorite spot with all of us.

Since I’ve resumed gardening, I understand her pleasure. Visitors to my home are given a garden tour as soon as they arrive.

My little garden bears no resemblence to Oprah’s vast estate, however. It is located on the long, skinny balcony that runs across the front of my condo.

I’m learning to keep things alive despite the intense heat that arrives every afternoon as the sun blasts my garden for several hours. The bordering pear trees provide shade for some of the day, thank goodness, and that makes growing a bit easier for all of my herbs and flowers.

There’s lavender in my garden, too, but it’s a single pot, not a field. It gives me as much pleasure, I suspect, as Oprah’s gives her. I plan to add another pot of a more fragrant variety than the one I began with.

It’s been nearly a dozen years since I created my last garden and every day this new one brings me pleasure. In a garden—or a business—one idea or activity tends to spawn another and another. I love watching the evolutionary process in action.

This one, like my previous gardens, has reminded me of another important thing. It is, in fact, one of the basic principles of my goal-setting philosophy. When making a change or enriching your life,  expand from where you are with what you’ve got.

That seems so obvious to me, but not everyone seems to realize that you don’t have to wait for perfect conditions or a large windfall or a Montecito estate in order to begin.

Have you ever noticed that folks who complain about everything they don’t have aren’t very good at using what they do have? Bemoaning what’s missing, tends to make what’s present invisible.

That is not the road to happiness or accomplishment.

It’s also not necessary. “Empty pockets never held anyone back. Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that,” said the wise Norman Vincent Peale.

Entrepreneurs seem to make mobilizing the resources at hand into an art form. They discover that turning on their imagination opens the door to opportunities that are right at their fingertips.

So what are you going to plant this week? Or beautify? Or mobilize? How can you put something to work on your behalf that you already have?

After all, a garden or a business doesn’t have to be big in order make a beautiful difference.

 

Creatives in the Garden

It would come as no surprise, I’m sure, to learn that I’m particularly sensitive to any mention of gardening as a companion to the creative process. Here are three very different stories that caught my attention this week.

When I was headed to Trader Joe’s last weekend, I heard a story on NPR about Trout Gulch Farm and couldn’t wait to get home and find out more about this place started by young filmmaker Isaiah Saxon.

According to the story on NPR, “With the help of filmmaking buddies Sean Hellfritsch and Daren Rabinovitch, Saxon has transformed 10 hilly acres surrounding his mother’s house in Aptos, California into Trout Gulch, a kind of rural hacker space where they build their own houses, grow organic vegetables, milk goats and produce state-of-the-art digital animation.”

Saxon explains how his group of 21st-century pioneers takes a do-it-yourself approach to just about everything. You can find out more about how these fellows are building their Hobbit village and building a successful business at the same time at Trout Gulch.

Four years ago, author Barbara Kingsolver had another bestseller with her nonfiction book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle written in conjunction with her husband and daughter.

The book chronicles the experiences of Kingsolver and her family who decided to spend a year eating only food they raised themselves or that was grown in their neighborhood.

As a result, Kingsolver found herself becoming the spokesperson for the locavore movement—and inspired countless others to start producing more of their own food.

The experience also inspired a small surge in the number of farmer’s markets around the country, plus a new enterprise started by Kingsolver’s spouse.

Her husband Steven Hopp reports, “My most notable commitment to local food has been to put the ideas I’ve learned into practice in our own little community. In 2008, I created a community business devoted to developing and promoting a local economy.

“The Meadowview Farmers’ Guild  is a two-part business, a restaurant devoted to local foods and a general store supplied with local hand-made goods from more than120 different individuals. The Harvest Table Restaurant is a casual fine dining restaurant devoted to sourcing its food as locally as possible.”

You can find out more about activities inspired by the book by visiting www.animalvegetablemiracle.com.

My favorite story of the week, however, comes from writer Elizabeth Gilbert who shared her experience on finding her lost curiosity by abandoning her writing and taking to the garden.

Read Gilbert’s short essay here: What to Do if You Can’t Find Your Passion.

 

 

 

Got Weeds?

Several years ago I was drowning in negative thoughts and feelings. What was needed, I decided, was some physical activity. I decided to pull the weeds that had infiltrated my yard.

Once I got into the rhythm of the project, I had the idea to imagine that with each weed removed, a negative thought was being removed from my mind. By the time I finished my task I was feeling noticeably better.

I decided that weeding was a fine therapy and have consciously sought to keep my mind as weed-free as possible. It took a while to realize that intentional weeding is also an important aspect of growing a successful business.

If I were going to describe the entrepreneurial journey in two steps, I’d borrow the title of Geri Larkin’s marvelous book—Plant Seed, Pull Weed. That’s pretty much what we do day after day.

Unfortunately, many people are better at the first part than they are at the second. Not long ago, I got an e-mail from a woman who had started a business, hit a slump and  abandoned her project.

She ended her account of the short history of her joyfully jobless journey by saying, “I guess I’m not cut out to be an entrepreneur.” That sounds like a big nasty weed to me.

Like so many others, she is cultivating a crop of weeds, not nurturing the seeds of what she truly wants.

An old definition says a weed is merely a plant that growing in a place where it’s not wanted. Likewise, as entrepreneurs we need to decide what we want to allow to flourish in our businesses—and what needs to be removed.

The Joyfully Jobless life is participatory, not a spectator sport. Try things. Be willing to do things badly. Reconfigure. Learn to find creative solutions.

So don’t be afraid to get dirty. Realize that weeds are a normal part of any worthy undertaking.

As Larkin reminds us, it’s also an on-going process, but it’s one with delightful rewards. Plant Seed. Pull Weed.

 

Catch the Passion

“Making a garden is not a gentle hobby for the elderly, to be picked up and laid down like a game of solitaire. It is a grand passion. It seizes a person whole, and once it has done so he will have to accept that his life is going to be radically changed.”

So writes May Sarton in her biographical  Plant Dreaming Deep which chronicles her first experiences as a homeowner. A total novice when it came to domestic matters, Sarton undertakes her first nesting experience with gusto.

In addition to remodeling the house, Sarton plants her first garden and discovers that gardening provided a perfect compliment to her literary life.

“One of the things gardening does for me is to provide a way of resting without being bored,” she says. “A day divided between writing in the morning and gardening in the afternoon has a good balance. And gardening is so rich in sensuous pleasures that I hardly notice its solitariness.”

Sarton isn’t the first writer to discover that gardening is a fine muse, of course. Consider the career of prolific Beverley Nichols.

According to his Wikipedia profile, “Between his first book, the novel Prelude, published in 1920, and his last, a book of poetry, Twilight, published in 1982, Nichols wrote more than 60 books and plays. Besides novels, mysteries, short stories, essays and children’s books, he wrote a number of nonfiction books on travel, politics, religion, cats, parapsychology, and autobiography. He wrote for a number of magazines and newspapers throughout his life.”

Despite his prolific literary output, Nichols is most remembered for his gardening books which share his personal experiences creating luscious green spots in London and in Surrey. Here’s a sample from Rhapsody in Green.

“In creating a garden we are creating—or endeavouring to create—a work of art. We are not merely filling  a blank space around the house, nor contriving a playground for tots, nor providing ourselves with enough spinach for our old age.”

Although gardening can be a satisfying undertaking in and of itself, of course, what Sarton and Nichols discovered is that taking up gardening also had a positive impact on their other creative endeavors.

And they’re not alone. Amy Stewart’s From the Ground Up is a wonderful story about a young woman’s first attempts at gardening.  Her challenges and triumphs will sound familiar to anyone who’s raised a startup business.

Another book I enjoyed is Ruth Kassinger’s Paradise Under Glass: An Amateur Creates a Conservatory Garden. Her first visits to the garden center were reminiscent of my first visits to a computer store.

This is just a small sampling of the tales told by gardeners who found unexpected adventures in their own backyards. If you’ve read and enjoyed a gardening biography, add your favorites to the comments here.

There’s one other story that I’m delighted to share. Holly Hirshberg, one of my Facebook friends, has been nominated for a CNN Hero award because of her work with The Dinner Garden. Here’s her inspiring story that appeared on CNN this weekend.

 

 

 

 

Planter or Picker?

Years ago a mentor of mine explained that the world, like an orchard, was divided into two groups: planters and pickers.

The planters, he said, see something that doesn’t exist and go to work cultivating thesoil, putting in seeds and plants, protecting their crop from weather, insects and other enemies.

Planters vigilantly nurture their fields despite risks and setbacks. Eventually, this sustained effort pays off as a great reward.

Pickers, on the other hand, arrive after the long months or years of labor and remove the fruit from the trees. Their involvement and financial reward is much smaller.

Pickers are interested in immediate gratification—no matter how meager. Pickers are not suited to the entrepreneurial life.

From the moment I heard this analogy, I knew which group I wanted to join. What distinguishes a planter from a picker? Here are four traits that set planters apart.

See Possibilities

Bugsy Siegel is credited with turning the desert town of Las Vegas into an entertainment destination. In a documentary on the history of that city, the narrator talked about Siegel’s vision and how alone he was in thinking something so unlikely would happen.

“Where others only saw sand,” said the narrator, “he saw a playground.”

Stephen Covey reminds us that one of the habits of highly effective people is they begin with the end in mind. That’s true for any kind of planter. No matter how far away the end may be, that vision is present at the beginning stage of any undertaking.

Plant a Lot

When I was putting in my first garden, my Aunt Agnes came to assist me. After we’d planted rows of vegetables, we still had a large corner that we hadn’t used. “Let’s just broadcast the flower seeds over there,” she advised.

I didn’t know what broadcasting meant, but she quickly explained it was scattering the seeds in no particular order. When my garden sprang to life, it had tidy rows of plants and  a wild flower patch at the end.

That garden was a lot like successful businesses: some parts are tidy and others are wild. The important thing is to keep planting seeds, making new connections, trying out new ideas, using different methods.

The neat and tidy parts will be satisfying while the wild and unruly parts will add surprise and color.

You’ve heard it said hundreds of times: you reap what you sow. In business, unlike horticulture, planting is a perpetual activity, not a seasonal one.

Protect Your Plantings

Cowards abandon their dreams at the first challenge leaving them to wither and die. Maybe they don’t understand that dreams, like seedlings, are fragile things and need protection from the assaults on their growth.

Just as plants need proper temperature, light and humidity for optimal growth, you need to create the conditions that nurture your dreams. You also need to protect them from damaging forces.

When actress Hilary Swank was asked about dropping out of high school at the age of 15,  Swank said that she had several teachers who kept telling her to give up her little acting hobby.

Even those who weren’t so overtly discouraging played a part in Swank’s decision, she said. “I couldn’t get inspired by teachers who didn’t want to be there.”

Recognizing the damaging forces and removing our dreams from those situations is equally important if we expect to bring our own to fruition.

Enjoy the Growing

The planters among us are wise enough to know that each stage of growth is necessary. They don’t look at their seedlings and demand an immediate  bushel of fruit.

Paul Hawken, who once said that all entrepreneurs should study horticulture to learn how to run a business, writes, “I am constantly reminded that plants that grow too fast are not really healthy, and that plants growing too slowly are not thriving, either.

“If you try to speed your business up, you won’t get it right and will have to do it over….Do you want to be a mushroom or an oak tree? Spores beat out acorns every time in growth rates, but never in longevity or durability.”

Then there’s this lovely image from Dawna Markova:

To live so that that which comes to me as seed

Goes to the next as blossom

And that which comes to me as blossom

Goes on as fruit.