039: Fix Forward

Starving Artist No More

A few weeks ago, I woke up to an email from a creative entrepreneur that I’ve been coaching over the past few months. This wonderful artist had recently faced some pretty big obstacles in their creative business and was feeling really discouraged. They had wanted to start a new thing in their creative work, but they found themselves completely unable to take that first step and get started. As a result, they told me they were feeling “brutally defeated.” And my heart broke for this wonderful creative. I just wanted to wrap them up in a big hug! Shame and defeat have no place in our work as creative entrepreneurs. In today’s podcast episode, I want to share with you some of the advice and action steps that I gave this delightful artist. When you are struggling with your creative work, there is hope. You have no need to feel ashamed or defeated. You are not powerless, and you can take action that will make things better. You can fix forward.

In this episode, you will learn:

• What it means to “fix forward” in the context of your creative business.
• How to reframe your mindset so that shame and defeat no longer weigh you down.
• Why it’s important to view our past actions with curiosity and inquisitiveness, not judgment.
• What questions to ask yourself so you can plan a workable strategy forward.
• Why launching messy is almost always a good idea, and why sharing that mess is a great idea.
• How to use your mess as marketing material so that your audience actually likes you more.

In this episode, I discuss the Pratfall Effect, a concept from marketing and psychology that can help us as artists feel more comfortable sharing our process, warts and all. Here are some additional resources about the Pratfall Effect:

• The Pratfall Effect - brief YouTube video that gives an excellent, brief description of what it is
• Why We Buy: Pratfall Effect - article from the newsletter Why We Buy about the Pratfall Effect and how it works in marketing
• The effect of a pratfall on increasing personal attractiveness - research article from the journal Psychonomic Science about the Pratfall Effect

I also mention one previous episode of this podcast, 038: The Price of Success is Failure.

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.