You can do this!

Here we are - 2008! I'm really hoping some wonderful things are in store for me and my card business this year. It was at this time, exactly a year ago, that I applied for my provisional patent for my gift card holder, with no real clue how to bring it to a bigger place. Here I am today, with a full patent application already in the patent office, and my cards are now sold at Whole Foods.

Not bad for one year. But I want more!

As much as I want more, and as much as I have big plans and big lists, it is scary. Yes, I do get nervous and scared, but I don't let that stop me from doing what I want. Isn't that really what courage is? Courage is not about charging forward without fear. True courage is about charging forward even though you're scared to death.

So, I decided to make myself a layout in my visual journal to encourage myself for the new year. I have a few little box drawers where I keep all kinds of paper scraps that I can't bear to throw away. I don't use these often enough, so I decided to make the entire layout from stuff in these boxes. I'm gonna use the good stuff!

The layout is filled with positive messages to myself - and to you - reminding myself that I can do it. I have a good idea. I have a good product. I just need to get out there and break down the doors. It won't be easy. No way. I'm literally competing with companies like Hallmark and American Greetings at the level I want to be. They have all kinds of exclusivity agreements with stores, ways of keeping anyone else out of the bigger market. Well, I plan on banging those doors down. I'm not giving up, even if it seems hopeless - it's not hopeless, I just need to try as hard as I can, not take 'no' for an answer, find another way around the 'no'.

On the left side of the layout above, there are mountains at the bottom - and I wrote "climb the mountains". I know you can guess at what those mountains are. To the left of that are stamped faces with eyes, because I am looking to the future, and analyzing what it holds for gift cards and my business. Did you know that according the the Wall Street Journal yesterday, the Social Security Administration is beginning this year a program to send people their money through prepaid cards? Yes, that's pretty much the same as gift cards. That's big folks. Did you know that consumers spent 60 billion (yes BILLION) dollars on gift cards last year? I would think at least half those people would like to have a lovely greeting card to put their gift card in.


Ok - back to the layout. On the right, I found some kind of game card that had "push" all over it - so I'm reminding myself to push on. I hope my idea will be "the ticket" to success, and of course, a better income. I want to "use the good stuff" in my life and in my art. Finally, on the play money I wrote "don't just move with the current", and I had some random fish stickers, probably from back in my beginning scrapbooking days - so I added those to further the "current" theme. What I mean by "don't just move with the current" is - I don't want others making decisions about my life and its direction. I want to be making those decisions for myself. The success of my greeting cards won't just happen on its own. Some magical moment is not just going to appear before me and all of a sudden my cards will appear on the shelves of your local grocery store or Target. I need to make that happen. I need to do the WORK to make that happen. And boy is it a lot of work!

I hope you all will think about what it is that you have as a goal for this year. It doesn't have to be a business goal - just, where do you want your life to go this year? Not a New Year's resolution - I don't really believe in those - but a real goal with a real plan. Open your visual journal (if you have one, or just start a list of stuff) and write yourself notes of positive reinforcement, positive encouragement.

You can do this.