If someone makes something look easy it’s a good bet that they worked really hard to achieve that result.
I’m now in my 23rd year as a Trainer and for only about the last 5-years can I claim to have been truly comfortable in every session I’ve delivered. I love my job, I really enjoy training and I find it easy…and that only took 18-years!
I remember in the early days when my knowledge was limited and I relied on a session plan to get me through together with a huge amount of notes to guide me during each course. The session plans went long ago and these days I can pluck anecdotes, models, theories and relevant experiences “out of the air” BUT that’s taken a long time.
As a speaker the ONLY way to get good is through “stage time”. You can plan and develop your talks all you like but that won’t help until and unless you get in front of some people and do it. And guess what, it takes a long time for it to feel comfortable, there is no quick fix.
With writing I’m learning that it’s the same deal. When I was midway through writing my first book I hit a brick wall and got stuck solid on one of the chapters. I tinkered around with others in the meantime, not getting very far, while this one strategy provided my first experience of proper “writers block!”
About three weeks in, getting more and more frustrated, I came across a short clip of an interview with Sylvester Stallone on YouTube. Long story short, the all action hero of so many movies, “Rocky” came to my rescue.
Stallone’s advice on writing was so obvious and yet so powerful. His trick was to write ANYTHING to get you going, it didn’t matter what just write SOMETHING knowing that…and this was the light bulb moment…over 90% of it is going to end up in the bin!
You see persistence is the key and in the midst of all the stuff that doesn’t work is the stuff that does and you have to go through it all in order to find it. That one tip changed everything for me and got me going again on the nightmare chapter and within a few hours I’d completed it!
I use that tip now for every new blog, every new training course hand out, every new speech and for the book I’m currently working on.
You see sometimes you need more than persistence. You need a little nugget of wisdom to get you unstuck so that your persistence can move you forward. I’ve learned that wisdom is always there – you just need to keep searching – and, in my experience, you’ll always find it.
So, whatever, you want to make look easy to others and make feel comfortable for you simply get your head down, roll your sleeves up, search for the knowledge, persist and make it happen. Then, very importantly, remember to give yourself a pat on the back when you appreciate the hours of hard work you had to put in to make it all look so very easy!