Let me explain.

I am very frustrated right now. I am frustrated because I’ve started this IM Journey and I have taken a few very small steps forward in said Journey, but that’s it. For the past 2 weeks I’ve pretty much been standing in the same spot looking around saying to myself “I wonder when I’ll begin to move again.”

It’s like I’m waiting for Godot.

What I find so frustrating is that I have the DESIRE to do it, but in the last 2 weeks…rarely the time. AND, when there IS time, rarely the energy.

Fortunately, I have the mental capacity to realize that as long as I’m doing nothing, there will be no results. Fortunately, I have not felt my desire to do the work decrease. My schedule has just been all too hectic. It feels like a sick internet marketing Catch-22 in that I want to do the IM thing so I’ll have time to do the things I want to do, but I don’t have the time (at least in the last 2 weeks) to do the IM thing.

Unfortunately, with 2 weeks of down time under my belt, I feel like I’ve lost all my forward momentum and I’m not quite sure where to pick up. Ok…I know WHERE to pick up (keyword research!) but I’m not sure how to begin. I am gonna have to dust off Holly’s ebook (is there edust?) and re-read the keyword research part.

In the mean time, I thought I’d pose a question to all you internet marketers out there who are reading my blog. For those of you who are experienced internet marketers – what processes do you go through in your mind when you have too much to deal with to work on internet marketing? Do you make the time no matter what? Do you allow life to happen and come back at it full force?

For those of you who, like me, are just getting started, what do you find yourself doing? Are you taking things in stride as they come and take the time to work on IM when you can? Do you trudge through your exhaustion when offline life happens and hope for the best?

Anyone notice that I used two literary references in this post? (I promise that wasn’t planned!)

Ok, I guess I AM dealing with frustration. I guess I AM making baby-step progress. If I weren’t, I guess I’d be throwing in the towel…but not yet!

As I mentioned in a previous post, Lifehacker did an article about setting goals. They talked about the reasons that people don’t like to setting goals and I talked about how I felt like they were talking about me.

The act of setting goals is difficult for me for a few reasons. I always carry small goals around in my head. They’re usually small and insignificant goals that don’t mean much in the grand scheme of things. Sometimes I feel a sense of accomplishments when I meet those goals. Other times I wonder who I’m kidding because I feel that they’re not really goals at all.

Fear of failure – I would say this is the number one reason that I have a hard time plotting out my ambitions. I’m not superstitious, but perhaps there’s a small part of me that thinks that if I write something down that want, somehow I’ll make it not happen. Maybe it’s not so much that writing it down will make it not happen as much as it is that there is a HUGE fear that everyone will see me as a failure if I don’t meet those goals. Maybe the problem is that when things are written down, there’s PROOF that the goals were set. There’s no room for dancing around it later.

I think that’s one of the reasons I hesitate to make my new internet marketing journey public (I mean to the people who know me in real life!). If they see what I’m doing and go and look at my goals then there are people in REAL LIFE who can see me if I fail. But – to the strangers who exist in pixels (as Anna so eloquently put it!) if it all goes to Hell, I can always log off and step out of the Matrix.

Well, now there’s a problem. Perhaps it’s less a problem and more a solution. The problem is that I have befriended some people in the Matrix. These people (as far as I can tell anyway!) are interested in seeing me succeed. These people have offered up their time and advice and I cannot let them down now. I cannot let myself down now.

So I’ve made a decision. I will be setting goals. I will be writing them down. I will be posting them for the world to see. I have no idea what these goals will be just yet, but I hope to have them posted soon. I guess in a way I’m setting a goal now. I hope to have my goals posted by the end of this week. I would go for sooner, but this is actually going to be quite an arduous task for me and I need time to think about it and put it together.

What I would ask of my more experienced friends is do you have any advice you can offer up to help me with this? How do you go about deciding what your goals are and the time frames you give yourself to meet them? I have some ideas in my mind about where I’d like to go, but I really feel like I am very unqualified to set reasonable goals. This is where internet marketing starts to get difficult for me (at the beginning???).

For those who are interested. I have finished reading Holly’s book. I will be going back and figuring out where I need to start. But I have met that “goal”. Now it’s time to start REALLY setting goals.

I know it’s only been a couple of days since I started this blog. I know I have to learn to crawl before I learn to walk. But I find myself getting frustrated already that I haven’t figured out what I’m actually going to do from the standpoint of making money online.

I guess that part of the reason I’m frustrated is now I’m back into my weekly work schedule and don’t have the time to do what I WANT to do – and that is work full-time on building income streams online.

One step at a time, Dustin. One step at a time.

I will say this, though. I found that today I was in a much better mood at work than I have been lately. I actually felt a little “lighter” today because I felt like there was a light shining at the end of the tunnel. I don’t hate my job, or my boss, or anything like that. I get frustrated with the way things go at work sometimes. A lot more lately than I used to. But over all I just feel so overwhelmed at work and, as I stated in my “About Me” page, I am not feeling that sense of satisfaction that I want by being involved in something that I feel really matters. The fact that I am working toward financial freedom is a stunningly refreshing feeling…even if I haven’t taken the first IM steps just yet.

So, there’s the update, but in the spirit of posting the questions that arise as well, I want to know what my (more experienced) friends think. As I am reading through Holly’s book, I keep finding myself thinking, “Ooooh, I gotta put do this now!” or “Hey, I gotta try that now!” In my mind I told myself from the beginning “Read the whole book first for the information. Then go back and read through again for instruction and implementation.” So far, I’ve done ok, but I’m getting anxious and impatient.

Should I stick with my initial gut of “read first, then go back and implement” or is there some advantage to trying out techniques as I read them? One of my biggest obstacles I’m going to have to overcome in this journey is my fear of failure. I read a blog post today (and for the life of me can’t find the link right now!) that talked about how you have to accept failures as a part of doing business and although I logically understand that, the thought is actually painful for me.

So – is my “read first, implement later” reaction something that’s risen out of my fear of failure or is it just good solid advice from the depths of my being?

Please – share of your wisdom! You’ve been here before, what did you do?

By everyone I’m referring to all my friends who know me as just Dustin. Not Dustin the Internet Marketer.

You see, so far I have not really shared this blog with anyone that has known me for a great deal of time. A part of that, I think, comes from back when I very first got into sales. I always enjoyed working in sales because I got to work with people…but I HATED trying to sell anybody anything. The worst part was when you had to get your momentum by starting with your friends and your family. Not that what I was selling wasn’t something they could make good use of, but I just hated being the sales-guy to my friends and family.

In my time of working in direct sales, I have sold Cutco Knives, Kirby Vacuum Cleaners, Herbalife, and came real close to joining Quixtar. Not that there’s anything wrong with selling any of that stuff, but in each scenario it was always “practice on your friends and family” – ugh!

Well, as a budding internet marketer, I’m not trying to sell anything yet. In fact, I’m not even to the part where I find a niche and go for it yet. So far I’m just doing some reading, some learning, and jotting my thoughts and experiences as I go. Yet there is a part of me that wants to keep this separate from my “real life” and that actually bugs me.

What just prompted this was finding myself on facebook and seeing that I have friends who are just friends I’ve known since high school and then friends who are in the IM world. I was thinking, “I could post a status update letting everyone know that I’ve started a new blog” and then thinking “oh, but then all my friends would see that.” I know it’s nothing to be ashamed of! I’m not trying to do anything dishonest or illegal. Heck, I’m not trying to sell anyone anything! And yet I find myself overly concerned about what they’ll think if they see that I am getting involved in internet marketing.

From an experienced internet marketer’s standpoint – is there anything that can be said about this? Perhaps it’s some kind of fear of failure that’s doing this to me. Perhaps I’m afraid that people will think I’ll fail. Perhaps I’m afraid of what people will think if I do fail. I do know this – I do not intend to fail!

There is a certain irony in all of this. I want to do this so I have the time to be who I really want to be. Yet, I find myself concerned about what the people who know me in “real life” will think about Dustin the Internet Marketer.

“Just Dustin” and “Dustin the Internet Marketer” are really the same person! So what gives? Any thoughts?

My first thought was that maybe they wanted to sell me the blog editor, but as far as I can recall, the editors I’ve seen recommended have been free.

So what’s the deal? Is there some advantage to using an editor that I am missing?