This is going to be different to much of what you read about the world of internet marketing, different to most of the posts on this blog and radically different to the post I started out to write.

I don’t know where you are on your journey with IM. Whether you are just starting out, or maybe making stacks of cash, or perhaps somewhere a bit like me – sick to your back teeth of not quite turning the corner. Seeing success dripping from the fingers of everyone around and never quite being able to catch any of it.

I started out this post with every intention of hurling abuse at Google. In fact I was toying with the idea of calling into question the validity of us all even bothering to chase recognition from so fickle an organisation.

Like many others, I have watched the work of many months starting to produce some income, only to have it trashed in a second by the guys at Google…..and yes, I know they owe me nothing, but I don’t think my sites are that bad, honest!

For them to now be saying things like “You don’t want this next update”,  just seems like taunting and certainly makes me despair of ever getting anything working solidly.

I’ve had a few ups and downs in internet marketing but I finally got to the point of being so low I couldn’t see why I should bother any more with it all. It all feels too hard and too much in the control of others! Even getting back into a paid job seemed like a better move.

Now, I hope you aren’t at this kind of low point yourself and I genuinely hope that all your marketing plans are coming together nicely, but I’m not going to finish the story just yet.

A Trip to the Paralympics

As some of you will know, I’m based in London (yes, look me up if you visit, I’ll buy the beers) and that means that my city has been the site of all kinds of athletics recently. You may have seen some of them 🙂

I wasn’t able to get to the Olympics, but when a friend said he had some tickets to the Paralympics on Saturday night, I jumped at the chance.

I’ve spent a day or two watching an event here and there and I have to say, that this pageant of achievement has completely smacked me in the face when I think about how down I was last week.

Here’s a shot of a 100m heat warm-up. Every one of these women was running on a single blade substitute for one leg – other races had double blade users (like Oscar Pistorius) – still others have no knee joints as well as no lower legs.

It might be tempting to point at the technologies involved and heap praise on the designers of these amazing bits of kit. I’m sure the athletes themselves push hard to be using the latest, greatest leg substitutes (in the same way the able-bodied athletes try to get the latest bike designs for example), but what has come through to me time and time again throughout the Paralympics is just the raw determination to win that these athletes exhibit.

It’s not about putting a brave face on disability, they want to crush records and get their names in the papers just the same as the guys from two weeks back. I watched the wheelchair 5000m race only to discover that they come off the final bend at 40 miles an hour, that’s just pushing with their hands and no fancy gearing like a bike. In fact, the winner pits himself against bike riders just to see if he can.

I hope you’ve been watching, I really do, because these folk have completely changed my point of view in the last week.

Check out youtube for a video of Richard Whitehead winning the 200m, running in a category above his because no other athletes can compete with him in his class (of disability). I struggle to watch it without getting choked up – it is that amazing.

Here’s another quick shot of the start of the blind women’s 100m race. That’s right – completely blind.

I’m not sure you can see it, but the guys in orange are linked by a wristband to their blind runner and act as human guide dogs. They are not allowed to cross the line before their runner.

Sounds easy until you realise that every swing of their hands and every stride therefore has to be in complete synchronisation with their runner or they would just pull apart.

It’s like running the 3-legged race from school days, but with a blind person as your partner and going at full speed trying to do a 12 second 100 metres.

So where does all this leave me?

I have been so humbled by these athletes and perhaps even more so by their stories, as well as their races, that I have had to change my thinking about where I have got to.

I’ve reached a kind of “How dare I?” point. When I compare the trials and tribulations I’ve been going through with the Paralympic athletes, I have no right to even start to complain. Their dedication and struggles dwarf mine so utterly.

It may be a very personal realisation, and I know that my problems are really pretty small compared to some, so it’s not like I’m expecting the same lightning bolt for any of my readers, but what it has done is completely re-energise my views of the kind of dedication I’m going to need to succeed with this business.

What Comes Next?

Every lesson needs a proper “So What” at the end of it, so here’s mine.

First off, I’m booked into the Warrior Event in Florida in 3 weeks time. It feels like a ton of cash (for flights, car and hotel) but I am convinced that I need to know more people personally. If you are on my list, you’ll be seeing an invitation to a few drinks just so we can all put names to faces. If you’re not, sign up before I send the email 🙂

Click Here to check out the Warrior Event here if you can come along too….the early-bird pricing is still in play….and yes that’s an affiliate link but skip it if you want.

As a result of the event timing, I want to put out two WSOs this month before I travel. This is a good, hard deadline and might force me to finish what I have started and get them out there.

On top of all that, I’m going to commit to growing the size of my list, probably by using solo-ads to start with. I’m still not sure about this tactic, but others have tried it successfully so I will give it a go. As a line in the sand, I will aim for 1000 people by the end of the month and see how that goes.

At the same time, I am also going to try to post something new and useful for beginners on the blog every single day of September. I’ve always been keen on teaching by example, so maybe there’s something I can combine in there with some work of my own.

Challenge.

That just leaves me to sign off by asking where you are in all this? Are you stuck, feeling desperate like I was? Do you think this is all just sentimental claptrap? Leave me a comment below, none of us have to be doing this alone.