Scott Perry's Blog, page 11

Limitless

There’s a moment in the second half of life where we realize there’s more living behind us than in front.

It can be depressing and even triggering.

But the second half of life is also an awakening that you and I haven’t yet even come close to delivering on our promise.

Life’s second half can be reframed as an invitation to tap into and deliver on your limitless potential.

If you have a sneaking suspicion that you can be and do more and better.

You can.

The rules of the game of life you were schooled for and occupied by in the first half of life are compliance, conformity, and competition.

Is it any wonder the game you were taught to play feels limiting?

Are you surprised that you never really felt like you were winning?

You can’t win a game you don’t want to play.

It’s time to reconnect with who you really are, what you’re really good at, and where you really belong.

It’s time to play your game.

All it takes is the will to acknowledge and engage your power to see and step into the limitless possibility ahead of you.

Your life is speaking to you because it wants to speak through you.

Let your life speak.

And here’s the best part.

When you’re playing your game, time expands. You’re present and living in the moment because you’re doing work that matters with people you care about.

You’re living your legacy.

Which means the time ahead of you is more limitless than you initially thought.

Ready to get clear about and closer to what you really want and live a limitless life?

It’s time to dial in your unique gift and hidden wholeness and step into your limitlessness through the art of encore living.

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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Jake Anderson - "You don't need to put all these barriers in front of you."

Insight and inspiration for flying higher in the difference only you can make from guests who have appeared on Creative on Purpose Live.

This week’s wisdom comes from a conversation with Jake Anderson, founder of Build with Jake.

Tune into the entire conversation here.

[JAKE] Pursuing excellence is really the idea here when it comes to taking action on something.

I have found a lot of value in operating in a feedback loop.

A lot of people, and I've made this mistake plenty of times, so I will raise my hand as guilty as charged, but when you're starting a new endeavor, a new business, you have this perspective of, "I've got to have a logo" and "I've got to have the website." Everything's got to be there and done before I can even go and serve anybody.

You don't need to put all these barriers in front of you to just start taking action.

Take action and keep yourself in that state of action and operate through a feedback loop. Go take a little bit of action. Play some soft offense. Get feedback. And let that tell you what the next one or two things that you need to do.

You don't have to overbuild.

Scott's actually helped me with this recently because I was, you know, I thought, as I said, I've fallen into this trap sometimes, and sometimes you need a good coach like Scott to remind you that, you know, "Hey, like I think right now you look like you're ready right now. Why do you need to wait? Why do you need to put things off?"

So, I would just remind anybody that is looking to take that first step to just take the step and remember that it's okay. Everything doesn't have to be done.

Build with your community. Build with your people. Let them be part of the process, and things will evolve as they should.

A lot of times when you do it that way, you'll look back six months and go, "Wow. I could have never conceived that this is what it would look like back when I started." But that's because you got your people involved in the process. That would be my piece of advice.

[SCOTT] I really appreciate that, Jake. Learning that does not lead to action is useless.

If you build out loud and in public in a community, then you'll get the feedback and the insight, and the inspiration you need to iterate more quickly and build something bigger and stronger.

As I was sharing with Jake when he was overthinking his thing, focus on what's essential and learn how to do that effortlessly before you add any complexity.

Jake just delivered a powerful nudge to take intentional action. What step are you taking today to show up fully for those you seek to serve and do the real work?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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What Success Is (& Isn't)

Success is not the measure of your ability.

Neither is failure.

In my work as an encore life coach, I look past success AND failure.

Here’s why.

We conflate success with our ability to make good decisions.

We confuse failure with our inability to make good decisions.

But here’s the thing.

I can make a really bad decision and get a good result (and often do).

I can also make a really good decision and get a bad result (and often do).

Decisions are NOT outcomes.

What to do?

Make better decisions.

How?

Here’s one consideration.

Better decisions align with who you really are (your values), what you’re really good at (your talents), and where you really belong (with people who share your values and need your talents).

In other words, better decisions are decisions made with intention and integrity.

And this next consideration is REALLY important.

Decisions involve risk.

And the thing about risk is, well, it’s risky.

Sure, a bad decision can result in a good outcome.

But if you don’t recognize that it was still a bad decision and you keep making more bad decisions like those, you will blow yourself up sooner or later.

Here’s one more tip, make smaller decisions.

Why?

Making better and smaller decisions mitigates risk and keeps you in the game, regardless of the outcome of each small decision.

Ultimately, the best decisions set you up to make the next best decision (and the next, and the next...).

This kind of decision-making approach is its own reward.

And isn’t that a reasonable measure of success?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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Stephen Cope - “Today is the opportunity.”

Insight and inspiration for flying higher in the difference only you can make from guests who have appeared on Creative on Purpose Live.

This week’s wisdom comes from a conversation with Stephen Cope, Scholar-in-Residence at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health and author of The Great Work of Your Life.

Tune into the entire conversation here.

[STEPHEN] “There’s a fabulous quote from Thomas’s gospel. It says, ‘If you bring forth what is within you, what is within you will save you.’”

“And then, there’s a corollary.”

“‘If you do not bring forth what is within you, it will destroy you.’”

The Bhagavad Gita takes that notion and expands it by saying, ‘If you bring forth what is within you, it will save you, and it will save the whole world. If you do not bring forth what is within you, it will destroy you, and it will destroy the whole world.’”

“I love that. It makes every day sacred.”

“You know, Emerson, at the beginning of one of his books, has this quote, ‘Only the days are Gods.’”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that today is the opportunity to bring everything you’ve got to that which is calling you.”

“I don’t care if it’s building a stone wall or saving a thousand people.”

Stephen just delivered some ancient wisdom for better modern living by playing your game all in and full out. How will you bring forth what is within you to save yourself and the world today?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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The Perils of Grandiosity

The journey to make a difference in the second half of life is fraught with contradictions.

The biggest one that I witness (and experience) is navigating grandiosity and insignificance.

Your life’s calling should be big, right?

It can certainly feel that way.

After all, we’re programmed to chase the grandiose in the first half of life.

We incessantly grasp for more money, more time, a bigger home, and a bigger reputation.

But it never feels grand enough, and this fuels feelings of insignificance.

Bigger doesn’t feel better. More never feels like enough.

What to do?

The antidote to “too big” (grandiosity) and “not enough” (insignificance) is the art of sufficiency.

Your life and work don’t have to be grandiose to matter and make a difference.

That your life and your life’s work are not celebrated doesn’t mean it is insignificant.

Isn’t a right-sized life alright for right now?

What happens if, just for today, you decide that you are sufficient as you are even as you strive to be and do more and better?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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Laurel Portié - "Go out and solve 100 people's problems."

Insight and inspiration for flying higher in the difference only you can make from guests who have appeared on Creative on Purpose Live.

This week's wisdom comes from a conversation with Laurel Portié, everyone's favorite social media ad strategist. Tune into the entire conversation here.

[LAUREL] "I'm gonna be bold right now to your audience right now."

"If you are not where you need to be, I guarantee that if you make your one solvable problem to have 100 conversations in messenger, 100 conversations in messenger, and all you're doing... You're not worried about getting people on a phone call."

"If you just have 100 people in messenger and you help every single one of those people solve one problem, I guarantee you will never struggle for another client again. It is that easy."

"It is not, what do they say? It's simple, but it's not easy to do. But that is literally the game.

"If you literally just help 100 people solve 100 problems in the next 90 days, you will never have to worry about where your next client's coming from, ever."

[SCOTT] "I love that. Well, I was actually, as we're coming to the end of our time, I was going to ask you to share one last final tip or piece of advice, but that's it."

"Because I think everything that you teach, Laurel, it's about skills. And the thing about skills is anybody can learn any skill, but you can't learn something until you actually start doing it. So, if you want to get better at human-to-human selling, marketing that feels good, that feels like you're presenting yourself ethically and with empathy, and with real integrity and investment in helping people solve their problems, go out and solve 100 people's problems."

[LAUREL] "And let's leave them with one tactic, right, that everyone could do. It'll take 30 seconds to do. One thing, okay, just exactly what Scott and I were just talking about."

"All you have to do, okay, is make one five-minute video explaining your methodology. Okay? That's it."

"Offer a freebie. Do not ask people for a name or email."

"Make a Google Document of some actionable thing that people can do with your methodology."

"So, in my case, right, if I'm doing a five-minute video on my power content strategy, I would give away my power content template, or I would give away the instructions on how to place the ad from start to finish. Right? Everyone just do that one video."

"Think about something that you can get people to raise their hands saying, 'Yes, I want that.' Put five dollars a day and let it run for 90 days."

"That will accelerate the process for having those 100 conversations. That's all you need to do."

Are you using social media or is it using you? Laurel delivered two powerful ways you can leverage social media ethically and with empathy to build authentic engagement with the right audience. How can you show up more generously on social media today?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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The Imitation Trap

Can you figure out how to play your game by playing someone else's?

When I first started to learn to play jazz guitar, several teachers told me that to become a better improviser, I had to transpose and learn solos from other great guitarists.

It was bullsh*t advice.

Sure, they could play an endless array of imitation riffs originally created by my heroes like Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt.

But while I would cut out and donate my own kidney to watch these originators perform live, I wouldn't cross the street to listen to one of these copycats.

Every one of those teachers had a degree from some fancy school with a jazz program.

Further evidence that the academy is where art goes to die.

You can't get where you want or what you want by following a road map and directions everyone else uses.

You must learn to use a compass and navigate your own path.

To find my voice and play my game as a jazz guitarist, I still listened to my hero's recordings, but instead of transposing and playing their solos note for note, I listened for and employed themes I heard across performances.

Charlie Christian's repetitive, bluesy phrasing and Django's playful trills and flourishes informed my solos but weren't carbon copies.

Instead of being a copycat, I became a conceptualist.

I listened to horn players and vocalists for inspiration.

Miles Davis taught me that intimacy and space could be powerful. Billie Holiday's limited vocal range revealed that pacing and articulation made for more evocative (and provocative) performance.

You can play the imitation game but can't win it because you're always following someone else's lead.

Sure, listen for good ideas and novel approaches. But if you're to have any chance of playing and winning your game, you will have to make them your own.

Where have you fallen into or settled for the imitation trap?

Isn't it time you decided to figure out your way forward in the game of life? 

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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The Antidote to Suffering

What is the source of suffering?

What’s the antidote?

According to several ancient traditions, attachment to desires is the source of all suffering.

So is aversion toward your sacred duty (aka “dharma”).

What’s the antidote?

I think it’s your aspiration and the action you take to achieve your life’s true calling.

I call your sacred duty or your life’s true calling “the difference only you can make.”

And I believe that to deny it or remain attached to the false promise of “the pursuit of happiness” is to be complicit in contributing to your own suffering.

What to do?

It’s time to play your game.

Need help defining or developing the difference only you can make so you can find fulfillment, forge meaning, and live your legacy by playing your game all in and full out?

The Art of Encore Living has free resources to get you started on our blog and YouTube Channel.

If you’d like a clearer and more curated approach to defining the difference only you can make so you can find fulfillment, forge meaning, and live your legacy in the second half of life, check out the new Art of Encore Living guide.

 

Your life is speaking to you because it wants to speak through you.

Don’t die with the difference only you can make still inside.

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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How to Invest Your Time, Attention, Effort, (& Money) More Wisely

Seneca was a well-known (some would say “notorious”) businessman, political advisor, and writer who lived during Nero’s rule of the Roman empire.

He even served as an advisor to Nero before the emperor sentenced him to die by slitting his own wrists.

But that’s a story for another time.

What’s pertinent about Seneca’s life for our purposes is his approach to considering business ideas that have potential and efficiently crafting them into proven assets that create prosperity.

In his books The Black Swan and Anti-Fragile, Nassim Taleb repurposed Seneca’s approach and called it “Seneca’s Barbell.”

I’m sharing an interpretation I developed based on a presentation by Nic Peterson.

Seneca’s Barbell is an approach to developing business ideas, navigating risk, and improving system reliability.

Here’s how it looks.

The first iteration of my coaching business existed as an idea with potential.

I turned it into a proven business asset earning a return on my investment of time and effort by simply:

Creating an offer
Defining an audience
Executing a direct sales strategy

I moved my coaching business idea across the barbell efficiently and effectively by focusing only on what was essential and doing it as effortlessly as possible.

So how’d I muck this up?

I listened to and emulated all the gurus, influencers, and experts and added unnecessary marketing components.

Here’s a list of all the things I began spending my time, attention, energy, and money on.

A logo
A website
An email list
A lead magnet
Content creation
Posting on social media platforms
A video channel
Mini-workshops
Webinars
Books

In short order, my barbell came to look like this.

Developing new business and marketing ideas is fine.

But suppose you don’t develop each one into a proven asset delivering a return on investment (saving time or earning me money). 

In that case, you create what programmers call “cruft” (unnecessary or outdated code that slows down and even breaks a system).

Put another way, by adding a bunch of marketing tactics to my sales strategy, I reduced the efficiency (and effectiveness) of achieving my goal (making a bigger difference while making a better living as a coach).

Bluntly stated, I went from spending most of my time doing the work I love (coaching) to spending most of my time doing the work I hate (marketing).

Does any of this resonate?

Does it make any sense?

Why do so many promising and talented difference-makers do this to themselves?

Turns out it’s not our fault.

Learn why here.

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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How to Make Decisions

Decisions matter. They matter a lot.

Why?

First, every decision to do something is also a decision not to do many other things.

Second, deciding not to do something is a decision and works exactly the same as above.

Third, a bad decision can end your ability to make any future decisions.

So, how do you decide?

I know that I abdicated my ability to make thoughtful decisions for far too long.

I decided to go along to get along with peers and authority figures.

I let my unconscious whims and desires decide for me.

Even worse, I let knee-jerk emotional reactions decide what I said or did next.

But one day, I decided I’d step into my power to make my own decisions based on who I was and what I wanted without impeding anyone else’s ability to do the same.

I decided to play my game.

And that made all the difference.

Now I try to make my decisions by framing what’s now and deciding what’s next based on what matters.

As a wise guy once said, “Character is fate.”

Decisions are not outcomes.

But they do matter.

Ready to play your game?

How are you framing what’s now and what’s next? Most importantly, what matters to you?

Scott Perry, Encore Life Coach at Creative on Purpose

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