Saying goodbye to the final piece of IWearYourShirt
On May 6, 2013, IWearYourShirt stopped actively promoting companies, but I told myself I wouldn’t let it die. IWearYourShirt was my baby and I had poured thousands of hours into it since 2008. Even though I hadn’t worn t-shirts for a living since 2013, I kept telling myself that I could try to help the countless people who email me and ask if they can create their own IWearYourShirt (or get paid to wear t-shirts).
Over the course of nearly two years, an average of 1,500+ people organically signed up for the IWearYourShirt email list every month. In the email marketing world, this is a dream. But for me, this dream was more of a stress-filled roller coaster. As the IWearYourShirt email list continued to grow, and the emails kept pouring in from people, the less I wanted to let go of IWearYourShirt.
Related post from 2013: Letting Go is Hard
By September of 2014, the IWearYourShirt email list had grown to more than 20,000 subscribers. But unfortunately, I was serving an audience that I wasn’t passionate about serving. I tried multiple things in 2013 and 2014 to teach people how to start their own IWearYourShirt—their own sponsored projects. I took on investor meetings and spent months (and lots of money) trying to turn IWYS into a scalable advertising network. I even thought trimming down the list to the most passionate subscribers would help, so I actively deleted 10,000 subscribers.
None of my efforts over the past two years with IWearYourShirt made me happy. Some of those efforts even made other people unhappy, which then made me loathe the company I had once sprung out of bed for. These types of feelings aren’t ones I want to have, and I’m tired of telling myself it will change.
Recently I’ve been trying to drink my own Kool-Aid. I tell other people that you have to build the right list of email subscribers. You have to focus on serving the people you are passionate about serving. I wasn’t doing what I was telling other people to do. I was continuing to spend time, mental effort, and money on a business and list (IWearYourShirt) that I wasn’t fully invested in.
It’s time for me to let go.
It’s time to actually hang up my final t-shirt.
It’s time for me to stop thinking I’m going to reinvent IWearYourShirt and create opportunities for people around the world to make money wearing t-shirts. That’s not what I’m passionate about anymore and I need to pull the plug.
To the outside world it may have seemed like IWearYourShirt was already closed down. If that’s the case, then I did a good job of almost letting go and moving to other projects. But for those of you who were on the IWearYourShirt email list and looked forward to the weekly thoughts and inspiration, I encourage you to join an email list I am extremely passionate about: The Action Army.
I want to thank those of you who have been dedicated followers, friends, and fans. Your support of me and IWearYourShirt has not gone unnoticed or unappreciated. Many of you on this list have been around since the beginning and I greatly cherish your dedication.
Maybe you’re holding on to something that isn’t serving you or bringing you value. Maybe there’s some aspect of your life that you need to sever the final ties. I know from personal experience it’s hard to let go, but it’s worth it.
I’m excited to move on and take all the energy I was spending on something I wasn’t passionate about and apply it to new projects and ideas.
Onward and upward my friends.
The post Saying goodbye to the final piece of IWearYourShirt appeared first on Jason Does Stuff.
