Nicola Balkind

Freelance Writer & Content Specialist

How I Start

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Getting Started

Last week I published a post on my big sticking point: Getting Started.

It wasn’t until afterwards that I realised that I hadn’t explained how I get over it.

Probably because I started without a plan.

So, here are some ways you can help yourself to get started.
 

1. Define Your To-Dos

If I sit down to work without an idea of what needs done, it’s a wasted day. So I always write my to-do list for the coming week on a Friday afternoon or – if time gets away from me – on Sunday evening.

Defining your weekly overview before the new week begins clears away the clutter of the week past, gives you a solid starting point, and can always be revised over time as things pop up and change.

For me, this means having a weekly to-do list. At the end of each day I write down my to-dos for the next day. If something moves, no worries, it gets copied and pasted to the next available time slot.

Knowing what needs done and when also gives me a deadline – even if it’s just to finish this blog post before my yoga class this afternoon.

Set yourself parameters and keep your priorities front-of-mind.

 

2. Remove Distractions

Close the YouTube tab. Close your inbox. Turn on the Do Not Disturb notifications feature. They’ll still be there when you’re done.

Sometimes if the dishes are looming, the best way to get them off your mind is to give yourself time to get them out of the way. It can be easy to get into a procrastination cycle here, but you know how you have the best ideas in the bath, or on the bus? Doing something productive and meditative can ease you into the right thinking patterns.

For me, it’s often something like watching one video, or doing the dishes.

This also relates to…

 

3. Set a Starting Point

Don’t let a stream of bits and bobs steamroller your day.

Committing yourself to a task that’s a little down the line, and takes place right after a certainty. It can makes a big difference.

So tell yourself: see once those dishes are done? Once I finished this cup of tea? When the postman comes? Then it’s time to start.

 

4. Start a Timer

Some people swear by the Pomodoro technique or variations on it. Setting a timer for 10-20 minutes and challenging yourself to start work can be really useful. But I also find that as the timer gives me a reason to get going, the buzzer goes off as I hit my stride.

My technique is to use Toggl (more on how I use Toggl here). You start a timer, define the task, then get going. Keep yourself beholden to the task at hand, and to the timer’s tick. You’ll soon realise how little time you spend actually focused on a task and how long it takes. No time feels more wasted than time deleted from a Toggl tab.

 

Your Turn

What are your tips for getting started? What’s your sticking point?

Here are some responses I got from last week’s blog (See? You’re not alone!):

What are your tips for getting started?

Getting Started

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Getting Started

Everyone has an Achilles’ heel when it comes to work.

Some of us are great planners and terrible at following through. Others of us love jumping in and setting to work, but run into hurdles two-thirds of the way through a project.

Me? I’m a terrible starter.

To give you an example, I’ve been sitting here for 2 hours staring at the prompts and topics I had planned for the month, feeling utterly uninspired by the lot of them.

It’s not a procrastination problem, you understand. There’s no staying up overnight til an hour before the deadline. That stress is not for me. I just have a tough time getting started. It’s the way I work, and it’s partly motivated by fear. It’s also motivated by a fact of writing: sometimes you don’t know what you have to say until you actually start saying it.

Once I get going, once the momentum builds, I’m set. It’s revving the motor I have trouble with.

So how do I deal with it? When I was on the Cultural Enterprise Office’s Flourish programme earlier this year, I had a mentor, Sophie Kyle (hire her here). She told me to find a starter, and it has worked beautifully.

Sometimes it’s been intentional, like kickstarting a podcast called Bookish Blether with my brilliant friend Holly. Other times it’s been pure luck, like being invited by the folks at Skriva to run a Finding Your Voice Online Workshop.

Having a starter isn’t always possible. Here, today, writing the September blog posts for this website, the only starter I have is myself. Sometimes I have to call upon others to hold me accountable, and other times I seek them out.

Here’s someone who’s been (unironically, promise) helping me out lately:

So… where do you get stuck in work? How do you get out of it?

 

Lessons from Small is Beautiful

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Small is Beautiful

As I’ve mentioned before, I love working with Roanne Dods and the rest of the amazing team on Small is Beautiful – an annual conference for microbusinesses and freelancers. I consider myself a bit of both.

This year’s event took place on 17 & 18 June, here in Glasgow. I was live-tweeting the event – a process I really enjoy. There was so much to keep up with, and after a while it became a process of hearing great scraps of wisdom fly in through my ears and straight back out through my fingertips.

The event featured an amazing array of speakers whose talks were filled with brand new advice and valuable reminders.

Today I want to share some of the highlights of the speakers’ shared wisdom – and some things that really resonated with me and my own business.

 

Standing out often means putting people off

As James Greig put it: “If you want to be magnetic, you must be as willing to repel as to attract.”

There isn’t a big committee mentality among microbusinesses, but when striking out on your own it’s easy to cast too wide a net. The more you try to appeal to everyone, the more standard and boring you risk becoming.

Patricia van den Akker had another way of making the same point, saying simply: “More businesses should be a bit more like Marmite.”

Are you putting off the customers who aren’t right for you?

 

Your time is a precious resource

Leah Hutcheon gave a talk about the value of time. We talk about spending, wasting, running out of time, but as humans it’s our most precious resource.

She also debunked that quote about how Beyoncé has 24 hours in a day, too. Unlike the rest of us, she has help. She probably isn’t worried about getting the laundry done before tomorrow’s meeting. Remember that.

 

You can use your fear as motivation

On Day 2, we revisited Akiko Kobayashi’s Pecha Kucha talk, which she delivered at our event back in December. It’s entitled Do The Talk That Scares You. My subtitle would be Apply liberally when feeling afraid. 

Her story is a stark reminder about the power fear can hold over you, and how you can choose to overcome it, one challenge at a time. And it’s just beautiful.

 

On reading & writing

Fi Scott gave a daring talk about her experience with starting a small tech company in Scotland called Make Works. She discussed everything from securing arts and innovation funding to the pit of despair. There were tons of gems in her talk, but the one that stuck out to me most was, “When I panic, I read.” I relate, but I’m just as frequently paralysed by panic.

I also took a lot of solace and inspiration from James Greig’s talk on writing. He told us that writing is like time-travel – an idea I’ve been juggling around in my head with unending amusement. He shared advice that I often give my collaborators, and hearing it back was just as powerful: “Blogging isn’t really about writing blog posts, it’s about telling stories.”

James also shared a great Elmore Leonard quote: “If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.” Simple, effective, and it made me return to my old habit of collecting and squirrelling away useful quotes for anytime I feel under-inspired.

 

Small matters

One of the biggest themes at Small is Beautiful is, unsurprisingly, the power of being small and staying small, but doing work that has a big impact.

This quote gave me great comfort:

“From little things, big things can grow.” – Lucy Simpson

 

 

The greater context in which we exist as microbusinesses in a macro business world was also explored. Ruth Little gave us a visual metaphor of the capitalistic obsession with growth resulting in cancers and Godzilla-sized hamsters. Then Katherine Trebek summarised on the final day with these thoughts:

“We’re overexposing our communities & our planet to the wrong sort of growth: obsessions with big, with status,and with self. [We need to] build from the bottom up, cherish the small in a world obsessed with big.”

 

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received about running your business?

You can find out more about Small is Beautiful at smallisb.com – and keep an eye out for recaps and videos of all the talks coming later this year.

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