Automation Is The Hero When Enthusiasm Is At Zero

We have to defeat our Bad Days

Our enthusiasm follows a cycle. That cycle is typically dictated by our motivation, which is then affected by our emotions. As we all know, emotions move in waves and cycles. We are enthusiastic when we are attracted by novelty and when we see results. We pull back and give up when we see the opposite.

This is human nature. Success gets our long-term attention. Cutting loss is in our blood.

That gets into the rhythm of longevity in terms of our commitment to success. When quantified, conventional wisdom dictates that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice is required for skill mastery. How many cycles of emotional highs and lows would there be in the journey of amassing 10,000 hours?

My guess is many.

It is the same for me. Iron-will discipline comes with time. When with that in our blood, there are days where our life energy is sapped after drowning ourselves in 10 cups of coffee. It just is.

The question is — Are we capable of defeating our bad days?

Yes, of course.

We start off acquiring new skill sets with enthusiasm. In fact, enthusiasm is the prologue of motivation. We can use the purpose of developing our writing portfolio on Medium as an example.

I started in Medium after reading about it on the internet. The ability to open that next revenue stream via writing attracts me. I performed my complex calculus at the back of the Starbucks napkin. Taking $50.00 divided by 12 months means I had to earn more than $4.17 a month to get a positive return.

That was the start of my writing journey. This is an ever-evolving journey as with other businesses I handle and the content portfolio that I am building on other platforms. We have to learn the rules of the game. Finding publications is one using the right tools is another.

We cannot just write. We also have to distribute. I will use Coca-Cola as an analogy here. There is no point in producing the best drink ever when the product never reaches the hands of the customers. Distribution is power.

In that sense, the business of writing is a legitimate business in itself where we have to uphold quality assurance (so Publications will publish our work), and we have to distribute our work to the marketplace.

Social media is where people are. It is almost impossible to find anyone holding a smart device without a social media account. To get a higher chance of readership, we have to allow our stories to be showcased on various social media platforms.

Yes, I am simplifying things. In this watered-down version, the effort required can be daunting, especially when we are confronted by our bad days.

Take, for instance, the number of stories we can write daily.

That number wobbles daily. A bad day could mean zero. A good day might be 3 stories. I am sure I am not alone. We can assume that we struggle to complete 1 story on a bad day. Would we be in the good to distribute our stories via writing styles that are required for our post to capture eyeballs?

My answer is .. Nay.

We have to prepare for our bad days. That can be done when it comes to distribution because there are multiple automation tools that we can tap on.

We can prepare our posts ahead of time and then schedule it for posting on FaceBook, Linkedin, Twitter, and other social media platforms of our choice. This can be performed through social media managers such as Hootsuite, Sprout, Agorapulse, MeetEdgar.

These social media manager platforms allow our work to be distributed, good days or bad. What we have to do is to prepare our posts in advance. I recommend writing more and storing them for future distribution.

That means we play to our emotional strength. We write more when we feel good. Store them away like squirrels. And then allow an automation platform to distribute them to the market over time.

This allows for consistent presence.

And truthfully, simple automation platforms like social media managers save my pathetic ass many times this year when I am low on energy.

At least I know that when I am totally wasted after writing that 1 story, I need not worry about distribution.

Those platforms will do the work for me, without me.

That is what I mean by “Hero” when I am feeling like a Zero. It has allowed me to defeat my bad days many, many times.

Give it a try. It works.

Automation and Enthusiasm Are Like Complements. Aldric

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About the Author:

As a Consultant by training, I believe in making the complex simple. Because simplicity adds value. And with clarity — We grow. Follow me for my stories on Medium!