Make sure you don’t neglect that element of you. You can do this by using your imagination, and then using it some more. Spend time writing down or sketching out your imaginative ideas whenever you can, like a child would plan building his fort. Bring a notebook around with you to document your plans, dreams and ideas.

Quit using up all your imagination on worrying, and create a vision that motivates you.

Go a step further than taking deep breaths, by actually strengthening and increasing the capacity of your lungs, which will in turn positively affect your breathing, increase oxygen levels, and ultimately your brain power.

Swimming laps under water will do this, as will running, playing sports and regular deep breathing exercises. If you ever wanted a way to noticeably increase your creativity and intelligence, this is it.

As ever, please share this via one of the buttons below!

The thing is though, they really are important, and really can get you some awesome achievements if you stick to them. But how to stick to them? Sometimes it’s hard to motivate ourselves towards goals.

The reason for this is probably that you haven’t set your goal posts wide enough, and you’re simply not aiming for something that moves you. Another reason could be that, even though you’ve set yourself a big goal, deep down you lack the belief that the goal really is for you.

To get round this, and to really motivate you, create a ‘career-shifter goal’.

This is a major goal that, were you to achieve it, it would noticeably change your own career for the good. Such a goal might be to write a best-selling book, get on the radio, work with a particular dream client, and so on.

This is the kind of goal that will re-kindle any sense of excitement you have about what you do.

Spend some time thinking about the goal. Make sure the prospect of achieving it is something that really excites you and make sure it has a specific deadline. Often this one goal will help you reach other goals associated with your business too.

Here are some more ‘career-shifter’ goal ideas:

• Have a solo gallery exhibition of your work by Sept 13th 2013
• Host an event by 1st January 2015
• Sell 50 products in a month by March 1st 2014
• Win a BAFTA by January 30th 2017
• Write a newspaper article by Sept 1st 2014
• Work with a fortune 500 company by February 3rd 2015
• Get 5000 hits on YouTube by December 24th 2012
• Receive fanmail by July 23rd 2016

Best of luck! What career-shifter goals will you set?

Is it doing your admin? Is it promoting your work by calling up people? Is it exercising in between long desk-based creative sessions? I’ll be willing to bet doing absolutely noting at all is actually something you barely do.

When was the last time you stopped everything you were doing and just stopped thinking and doing?

Sit there. Relax yourself. Be with yourself. Observe anything that comes to mind.

See how you feel when you do ten minutes of this. You will be motivated.

This means that starting a new project doesn’t need to be difficult if you are not worried about starting off in a slow, lazy way. Do a bit of research on Google, chat to someone, draw a sketch, write a note.

If you get going on something, no matter how un-focused and how small the effort is, it will get you going. From there, it will get easier and easier.

Although I was aware of the importance of defining purpose in what you do to keep you motivated, Simon Sinek revealed the importance of the need to define a belief or purpose as a key element of attracting a following in highly successful businesses, companies, projects and even movements.

For a company or a leader to truly inspire action in people, they need to clearly define a purpose or a belief behind whatever it is they do. People will support, buy from and follow a leader or organisation that has a belief in something that they too believe in.

From that point on, it’s no longer the quality of the leader per se that inspires the participation of his followers, but the shared belief delivered by that leader that people want to be a part of.

What does this mean for a freelancer, where inspiring a following is central to one’s success as a brand?

Think about how you can transmit a sense of purpose or a belief to those around you. This will set you apart.

See the talk here.

Comments are encouraged!

By this I mean that the gradual and more long-term approach will beat the rapid-action, ‘all at once’ approach many of us take to try and hurry things along. It’s better to send out 5 personalised and appropriate promotional emails every weekday than sending out 200 non-personal emails each month.

Instead of doing some self promotion once a month, do something small daily and stay consistent. You’ll find it’s easier to stick with doing small steps over the long-run than having to remind yourself to occasionally bulk email, for example.

This business is about gradually developing relationships with people, whether you like it or not. Being impersonal and occasional in your marketing effort will mean you lose out in two ways:

1) People will not respond to advertising from you or anyone that is impersonal or looks like you put little effort into it.

2) You lose out on gaining constant exposure, because you’re putting in more less frequently, rather than less, more frequently.

So, as you commit to promoting yourself and your brand, I recommend you apply the little by little approach in attracting prospects and keeping in touch with people already in your network.

Promotion of some kind should really be something you are doing everyday.

Good luck!

Just be unexpected. We are all creative. Creativity has nothing to do with originality. Come up with all kinds of unexpected solutions to things in life.

This can apply to projects you work on, as well as the way you promote yourself. Being unexpected will get you noticed.

Get thinking! Go with your instincts. Unexpectedness pays off.

Most of us don’t ever focus. We are always trying to think of too many things at once and this is having a bad effect on our progress as creative geniuses.

Focus on what you want in each moment, and it will come into your life.

There, that’ll motivate you… I hope…!

’9 Steps to Being Your Most Powerful Creative Self’

The book has received a great deal of praise from major players in the creative industries and elsewhere.

“Alex’s book gives vital focus to those that create in the blur between chaos and creativity. An important guide for those looking to take risks and dream big.”

Fabien Riggall, Founder & Creative Director, Future Shorts, Future Cinema

“I admire Alex for making it a priority to organize his creative insights in long form. It’s an uncommon practice these days, to make time for writing, and I’m better because he shared his with me.”

Zach Klein, Founder and CEO, Vimeo

I’m sharing the book with you at a specially 30% reduced launch price until the end of Friday this week, September 9th only, so you need to be quick to take advantage of this.

Go here to read more about, and purchase the book, along with some hugely valuable free bonuses.

Enjoy it and best of luck!

–

Want to earn some money from helping me promote the book?

If you’d like to become an affiliate and make earnings of 50% on each book you can sell, have a look here.