This content stuff is freakin’ hard for a LOT of peeps out there -

“I can’t do what you do!”
“I’m not organized.”
“I’m a terrible writer/hate my voice/dislike video.”

It’s easy to feel this way because there’s a LOT of information floating around out there…

Sometimes it’s conflicting, or you don’t know who or what the hell to trust…

We start to fall into this belief of, “I can’t do this.”

Or, “I’m no content creator. I can’t keep up. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Today we explore how these thoughts/beliefs are at the heart of our struggle with creating content…

And what to do about that!

Let’s unpack how to start shifting into believing that it’s 100% possible that this all CAN BE easier!

SO THAT you do not have to spend HOURS worrying about it anymore.

Listen in to learn how you already ARE a creator, with expertise, insights, and a distinct POV –

Because when you realize you ARE a creator – even if you’re “disorganized”, overwhelmed, or hate the way you look on video…

Creating content gets a thousand percent easier AND you start achieving those business goals you’ve been reaching for FOREVER!

Resources mentioned in the episode:

The Content Creator’s Studio: https://www.jenliddy.com/studio

King Gimp: http://www.kinggimp.com/kinggimp.html

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Full Transcript

Hey. Welcome to this week's episode of Content Creation Made Easy. I'm your host, Jen Liddy. Today I want to talk about how to think like a content creator. It's not as hard as we make it out to be, but a lot of people believe that they aren't content creators, that they can't be content creators.

And I just want to unravel that belief by diving into some things that I learned when I was teaching college. And maybe this little story I'm about to tell you can help you start to think like a content creator. So I'm taking you back to 2017. I was teaching college at a local community college. The class I was teaching was called The Foundations of Success.

And it was really a mindset class. It taught students how to be personally responsible, how to manage their emotions, how to be self aware. It was the most amazing class. I would still be teaching it if I wanted to drive 50 minutes each day to go to this school. But toward the end of the semester, invariably the students would be really overwhelmed, really stressed.

You probably remember that at the end of school when you're just like, there's so much to do and there's so many finals. I have so many papers. And I remember walking in the end of the semester and they were just like they did not want to talk to me. They were pouty mostly. They were just really feeling sorry for themselves.

And this is always the perfect moment for me to pull out a lesson that I have. It's my favorite end of the semester blues lesson, and it's called I call it King GIMP. King GIMP is a documentary. It actually won Academy Awards. It was created back in 1999, and it's about Dan Kepler.

They followed him from ages twelve to 23. Dan was born with severe cerebral palsy and he lives independently, wound up graduating college, is an independent, successful artist living in New York City. But nothing is easy for Dan. And that is displayed throughout the entire piece, the entire movie. You see how hard it is for Dan to speak and dress and type and even eat.

Everything is hard for him. Now, every year when I show this video, the students always get hooked on Dan's story because he never feels sorry for himself and they can see how hard his life is. In fact, his life is so much harder than their lives that they just get completely consumed with it. But because he never feels sorry for himself and he's always got some new goals that he's setting. He's very inspirational to my students.

So every year the film, I know it kicks them right out of their funk, and it gets us back into some meaningful conversations about foundations for college success. So what I would always do is after the movie, I would put students into pairs to think about some reflective questions. And one of the questions I would always ask is, what scripts does Dan have running in his mind to help him stay focused and accomplish his goals? Now, for this class, scripts, what that word means. We used it to mean the unconscious thoughts and the unconscious beliefs that we have that are in charge of our life.

We don't even know that we're thinking them half the time, and they can propel us forward, or they can hold us back. It really depends on the script. And so I was asking the students, tell me what you think is going on in Dan's mind. What's his script that he must be practicing in order to propel him forward so intensely and so consistently? And the students would always come up with amazing scripts.

I can do anything. Anything is possible. I will not let my limitations define me. I am an artist. I would wind up with a room full of wonderful, positive scripts that they believe Dan must be thinking.

But one year, I had a student who very quietly raised his hand. Now, the student was often disengaged in class and usually didn't partake in the discussion, but he raised his hand, and he said something that stopped us all in our tracks. He said, I think he's got to be thinking I'm a nuisance. Now, months before, this student had confided in me privately that he himself struggled with cystic fibrosis, and that causes him many daily difficulties. But in this moment, we're in front of the class, and now I cannot assume, as the teacher, nor ask directly in front of everyone if he is putting his own script into Dan's situation.

So we did this thing, the script assessment model that I had been teaching all semester. And I wanted the students to be able to analyze it for himself. So I basically took him through the assessment, and I was like, what's Dan thinking I'm a nuisance? Okay, if he's thinking that, then how might he feel? What must he be feeling if he believes he's a nuisance?

And the kid said, ashamed. Okay, if Dan feels ashamed, how does he act? What are his behaviors? And my student said, he would hide. He would stay away from everybody else.

He would want to be alone. And then I said, so if he's isolating himself, what results? What outcomes would he get? And he said, Well, I guess he would be disconnected. I guess nothing would happen.

Like he wouldn't get anywhere. So then I asked the big question. So, based on what you saw in the film, does Dan act disconnected? Does he do nothing? And the student kind of went, you just kind of gave me a harump.

And then he gave me a moment of silence. But I could see that his brain was turning with, what does this mean? Why isn't this adding up? And he finally said, no, not really. And so I knew that this student has some processing to do.

And he nodded at me and I knew that was time to go on. And later, the student came back and told me that this nuisance script must be his own, because based on everything he saw in the movie, there was no way that Dan believed he was a nuisance. Now, did my students brain flip from, oh, my God, I'm such a nuisance to people too? Oh, I can do anything. My limitations are endless.

They will not define me. No, it's not the way our brain works, right? Like, we've got years and years and years of thinking these thoughts. It's just not the way it works to flip it on its head. But that awareness is a powerful catalyst to get him started making new choices in how he wanted to show up in his own life and how he wanted to set and achieve his own goals.

And in my current world, far outside the classroom, here I am talking about content creation all the time. And people share their scripts with me about content creation constantly. And they usually sound something. There's lots and lots of them. But I'll come up with the top five.

I think I'm not organized. I can't keep my thoughts together and then people kind of struggle. I'm just not organized, right? I just can't do it. The second one is I'm too creative and spontaneous to plan.

I'm just going to do my content when I feel like it or in the moment, but actually it really never gets done. The third script I hear is really one of those self harsh, self judgment scripts of not a good writer. I don't like the way I look on video, and I hate my voice. That's a vein of scripts that I hear. And of course, if you think you're not a good writer or you look terrible on video, you're never going to do any of those things, right?

Another script I hear a lot is, who wants to hear what I have to say? There's so many people out there doing what I do. They don't need my voice out there. And then the last script I get a lot is like, it's just too complicated. I will never learn how to do this.

I don't even want to learn how to do this. And so unwinding all of these scripts is really what my job comes down to as a content creation specialist with, you know, I use frameworks and I help people find the ease in it. I give them ways to make it their own. But ultimately, if you want content creation to be easier, it has to start with the belief that it's possible, that it can be easier. Content creation.

I could tell you all of the how's, which I pretty much do inside my membership. I share a lot on this podcast. A lot of my free content is a lot of like, here's some things you need to do. But unless you believe that it's possible for it to be easier and for it to work for you, you're going to be stuck and it's going to feel like a nuisance to you. And I want to remind you, you already are a creator because you're an expert.

You have insights, you have a point of view, you have something to say. Maybe it's just all living in your head and you haven't gotten it out yet. Maybe it doesn't feel easy or intuitive yet, and that's why you tell yourself, I'm not a creator. And all of those thoughts are very normal. So we start to address them.

And that's what today's podcast is about. I would love for you to start thinking about how can you squash some of the scripts that are holding you back from just being a content creator? Because I'm going to tell you, I could give you everything, every framework, every piece of information. And until you believe that it's possible for you, it won't even matter. So where are you kind of bumping up against your own beliefs, your own thoughts?

Where are you bumping up against yourself? Now, coming in October, I'm going to share with you a free training called Step Off the Content Treadmill. This will address some of these scripts, and I will help you kind of walk away with four to six weeks of content planned out. But until then, what are you doing in terms of thinking like a creator? It is really possible to revise the scripts, but first you have to be aware of them.

And if you want to jump in right now and get support with this, you're always welcome to join the Content Creators Studio. This is all of the stuff that we address weekly in our drop in calls. You can go to https://www.jenliddy.com/studio  to be part of that right now. And one of my members, Shanice, I think she said it the best.

She said the studio is not like, here are our methods and we just follow. Jen helps me think like a content creator, so I'm able to see my stories in the world, watch my thought processes, catch my content and write it down. I love it. And that's from Shanice Jones. She's a relationship coach and guide.

And that is what you can do. You can start thinking of yourself as a creator, thinking that it is possible that content can be uncomplicated, thinking that it's possible that you can get the ROI for the time and the energy that you're putting forth in your content. We can all do content better, myself included. I'm not above the fray in this, but the difference between me and somebody who's not putting content out there is that I believe that I can do this. I believe it can be fun, I believe I can do it my way, that I don't have to buy into the marketing BS and marketing bullshit that's out there and that I believe I can just always get better and better.

Ultimately. I think the thing that really keeps me going is I believe my audience needs to hear what I have to say. And maybe that sounds arrogant to you, but I want you to think about your audience, what are they struggling with that they need to hear from you? It's not arrogant, it's helpful. It's service.

Your marketing is service. It's in service to your audience. And so if you, like my student, think you're being a nuisance or content is a nuisance, I want you to remind yourself that that's a belief and that is keeping you stuck in a content hell that you don't need to be in. So be on the lookout for me to share the links for the free workshop that's coming up in October. It will be the first week of October.

I'll share it as soon as it's ready. And until then, I would love for you to think about what scripts are running around your brain, what's holding you back from growing your business. If you hate writing, well, then writing isn't my way. It doesn't have to hold you back. It could just be, I'm going to speak, I'm going to show up on video, I'm going to talk extemporaneously on a tick tock.

It doesn't have to be writing, right? If you believe like, oh, I hate the way I look in video, the only way to get better at that is to show up and watch that. You can show up for video and you don't have to be perfect because nobody on video looks perfect. And frankly, the people who do look perfect on video, people don't even kind of believe that they are real, right? So I want you to think about what are the things holding you back, the scripts that you keep thinking about that could be so much easier and making content so much easier for you.

If this sounds like something you need support with, go over to https://www.jenliddy.com/studio  and just get in the studio. We have weekly drop in calls. We can help you with exactly all the stuff that we plan your content with you and we answer all of your questions transparently. But until then, I would love for you to just leave a message on this podcast and let me know how you feel about it. If you can leave a review and rate us, that would help more people find us.

But it would also let me know, is this the kind of content that's helpful for you? I would love to see you back next week. I really appreciate you being here. I know there's a lot of podcasts out there. Let me know your thoughts about this idea of scripts.

Talk to you next week. Bye.