Author | Illustrator | Storyteller

How does a person motivate themselves to keep working when there is no guarantee of compensation or reward? I’m a creator. I write and I illustrate. Primarily on projects I own and that are self funded. In this situation you are your own boss, and often your primary cheerleader. There needs to be a drive , even a love of sorts for the work.

To aid myself in this I will take stock of what I’ve accomplished and truly look at it in perspective.

I have a day job to pay my bills. Fifty hours of each week on average is given to this day job. Leaving me nights and weekends to do my work. I keep this truth in mind as I consider my accomplishments.

In the last four months I’ve fully outlined, and written 49,000 words a new novel, pencilled 30 pages of Chapel:Honor #2, inked, refined, or retouched inks on about 10 pages, and redrawn the cover of my graphic novel Fifteen Minutes, drawn about ten sketch commissions, and completed pencils on four new original prints. I also had the privilege to help my brother Willis outline his new project, and I’ve been working with Tracie to get herself positioned to go full time as a nail tech after school. Some could say I’m bragging, or just trying to make myself feel good. That’s the point. I’m motivating myself through acknowledging the momentum I’ve accomplished and decisively choosing to continue.

If you are like me, pushing yourself towards a career goal, while holding down a day job and the responsibilities of life, try this when you feel stressed, overwhelmed, or start thinking about quitting.

You could also be like me and find yourself thinking that for everything you accomplish it never feels like enough.

For example, my graphic novel should’ve been completed years ago, literally. Chapel: Honor, should’ve been completed last year. Yet to focus on that would not prove beneficial to anyone.

No one will know the details of our individual circumstances, our prospective opportunity, or how we may have envisioned our potential success when we started out, more than we do. And to focus on what could’ve, should’ve, or would’ve been should circumstances had turned out differently is as ineffective as complaining that you’re not getting anywhere when you haven’t even started the car yet.

Acknowledge the bad, and focus on the good. Acknowledge the truth of your situation, and focus your efforts on the areas where you have true influence. We cannot change what has already happened, but we can make decisive decisions to motivate ourselves to move forward. One of the ways we can do that is to provide ourselves with an honest acknowledgment of the success that we have had. No matter how small, or minute. Celebrate that success, build upon it, and capture for yourself the momentum that will drive you towards seeing your dreams, that I’ve become goals, become reality.

Make IT Happen

Too often seen solely as synonyms, Simple and Easy can be truly differing concepts when applied to meaningful aspects of life.

Simple is defined as “Easily understood or done; presenting no difficulty; composed of a single element.”

Easy is defined as “Achieved without great effort; presenting few difficulties; free from worries or problems.”

At first glance it can be very difficult to discern how these concepts might be different. The separation becomes clearer through implementation. Let’s consider how this plays into our ability to Make IT Happen.

I was in a conversation recently with a friend who is striving to move things forward in their life and is finding it particularly troublesome. Yet the trouble isn’t in in the doing of the things that must be done, it is in their perception of the process of those things.

You see the things that must be done are quite simple. Almost like stacking bricks for a wall. One by one, brick by brick, and then Ta-Da! You have a wall. Yet as simple as the process is, these proverbial bricks were heavy and difficult to stack, making this simple task anything but easy.

We may find that our emotional outlook on a situation has made the accomplishment of a goal incrementally more challenging. How do we combat that?

First it can be helpful to take into full perspective the task at hand. What is it we desire to accomplish? Do we want to be in better physical shape? Have a better job? Improve our personal relationships with others? Or perhaps we simply would like to feel happier in life. Whatever our desire may be, there will be a cost to attain it, and thusly we must be willing to pay that price.

Often the cost entailed is quite simple.

Do you want to be in better shape? Exercise and eat healthy.
Do you desire a better job? Update your resume and start applying.
Do you want to improve your personal relationships with others? Make a decided effort to address their needs ahead of your own, and communicate your needs vs your wants more effectively.

Where it stops being easy is in our emotional connection to those costs. Perhaps we have a dependency on foods for comfort, or we are scared over the uncertainty of starting a new job with an unfamiliar company, or we may struggle with vulnerability and fear when it comes to opening up to others, thus limiting our ability to communicate effectively. Whatever the case may be, these emotional dispositions to our simple solutions do not an easy situation make.

To combat this, a strong first step for us to make is to adjust our perception. When our emotions are making an opportunity for growth challenging it is because we are focused on the potential challenges, the possible negatives, or basing our expectations upon past experiences. All of which are as justifiable to focus on as the far more beneficial option: The Opposite.

Rather than focusing on the possible “bad” of a moment, focus on the promise of good that could come from it. Primary of which is the accomplishment of our goal.

By driving home the point in our own minds that the means to our achieving what we desire comes at the necessary adjustment to our thinking to risk the possible pain of change because we can see that the only way to possess this change is by putting forth the effort, we will pay the price necessary. It really is that simple.

Recognize the truth of a situation, and focus on the good.

Through this decisive choice we can train our minds to embrace these moments as opportunities for growth, rather than fear them due to the potential pain of change. Also through this we are not deceiving ourselves. It isn’t easy, it isn’t without risk, or pain, or sacrifice, rather it is with all of these things as a necessary part of the cost associated with accomplishing our goals.

Simple doesn’t mean Easy.

The accomplishment of our “IT” all boils down to personal accountability. We desire the change, and so it is we who take the initiative to insight change. There are those in life who may help us, but they cannot do it for us, and to what extent they are able to gift us anything in life, if we are not actively engaged in the process we will eventually lose what we have gained.

If you desire change, and find the steps forward to be less than easy, take a moment to see the simplicity of what must be done, focus on the good of making the investment to accomplish your goals, and then act. Put in the work to achieve your goal and make the payment required by risking pain and failure, trusting that though we may fail, we will never succeed without putting in the work.
Control your perception. Stay Focused. Focus on the good. Put in the work. Make IT Happen!!

Thank you for reading,

Anthony Hary

We live in an environment where entrepreneurial ambitions are celebrated, and in almost all arenas of life people are being encouraged to pursue those goals. For those who set out to blaze their own path a strong truth quickly becomes evident. We must stay motivated.

What is your motivation? What gets you up out of that chair, or out of bed in the morning, and pursuing your “IT”? Is it Money? Perhaps Fame? Or perhaps you simply love the field you are working to play in? These are key things to consider because without motivation to forge on, we will stop moving.

The very nature of an entrepreneurial effort means at its base that we are not being paid. Sure we may make profit from our efforts, hopefully a healthy portion. In the start however we are simply working. We’re waking up and clocking in the hours. To a large extent we may never know if anyone will even realize what we’ve done or set out to do. Before that can happen we must complete the effort and have a product to offer. Through this effort there will be, notice the “WILL” and not might or maybe, there will be moments where quitting seems our next best step. What will motivate us to keep going?

Bestselling Author Jim Butcher has said, when asked what motivates him to push through writers block and complete his novels, his motivation is simple: He has a mortgage. This brazenly truthful statement drives home an inescapable fact. No matter our “IT” that we are pursuing, life continues on. With all its demands and costs and expectations, life offers little allowance for procrastination or slacking. This supersedes any passion or emotionally grounded motivation, this is reality.

Where emotions can waver, and hope can fade, if we build on this practical truth that to see results we must put in the work, we will see results.

This logic applies to any effort, not entrepreneurship alone. If you are an employee, stay at home parent, or simply trying to build a new skill or finish school, it all applies. Here are four steps we can apply to help us stay motivated:

1. Set Goals. – This can sound redundant. We hear it all the time. In this case, we hear it often because it works. The clarification should be added that we need to set up progressive goals. It is always good to have a main goal, an end game established. For example you could be working to drop weight and get in shape, so you set up a goal weight and size to work towards. If that goal is more than 10lbs from your current weight, why not set up progress goals? This allows you to hit attainable goals and build momentum, which is quite motivating. It also promotes a pathway to track success.
2. Celebrate Accomplishments. – As we progress and reach our goals, enjoy those moments of accomplishment. Perhaps your progressive goal was a daily call number to reach out to 10 potentially new clients each day, and you surpassed that. Enjoy that, celebrate it. After you’ve surpassed that goal a couple times, increase your daily call to 15, or 20, and when you reach and exceed those goals continue to celebrate that accomplishment. This continues to build momentum and foster growth and progress in our efforts.
3.  Help Other Succeed. – So often in our own efforts to become successful we become myopic and lose sight of the whole picture. Make a purposeful effort to step back, and help other reach their progressive goals. Even if they are someone you might view as competition, encourage, support, and aid them where you can. Then as they reach their goals, celebrate those accomplishments with them. We will find ourselves encouraged in the process and our desire to keep up with those we support will keep us motivated.
4. Be a Student. – No matter what we are trying to accomplish, be a student of it. More than simply learn what to do, strive to know it, understand it, and be a practitioner of it at a level that we could keenly explain it to another. If you are trying to grow in your career, do not be comfortable simply being able to do your job well. Grow beyond that by understanding the business, learning supportive roles, and actively seek out opportunities to be involved in aspects outside of your assigned role. If you are focusing on your fitness, do not simply rely on a personal trainer. Instead approach it as if you were going to need to be someone else’s personal trainer. Learn the moves, lifts, stretches, and logic behind the activities involved. Study the nutrition, track your progress, test things out, and approach it as if you were looking for the treasure hidden within the activities itself. Even more so if we are pushing out to be an entrepreneur, we do well to pull back the curtain on the area we desire to work in. Learn the market, trends, and methodology already applied. Track patterns of success, and failures, as if we weren’t working to build our own business, but working as a consultant to help someone else launch theirs. Recognize that this is a craft, an art, and our mastery of it only comes through the ongoing effort to learn and know it fully. The better we position our perspective and understanding, the stronger our grasp and more firm our motivation to succeed will be. We will be able to truly see opportunities, and better avoid pitfalls, as we more than have a map of our terrain, we are the guide.

When all the chips are down, motivation is a choice. Choose to do it. Choose to Succeed. Choose to put in the work. If we implement these four steps we will strengthen our ability to choose wisely.

Stay Motivated, Stay Focused, Make IT Happen!!!

Thank you,

Anthony Hary

(Images from Google images)

Eventually we die…

Morbid as it may seem, this was my lesson for August. It was also the greatest invocation towards why we need to Make IT Happen!

Through financial hardship, physical injury, and everything else I’ve been working on completing the graphic novel FIFTEEN MINUTES for the better part of this year. The book is inspired through my perspective of my uncle Kevin’s fight against cancer. On August 4th, after a 2+ year battle, he died. Just four days later, my dear friend Nick Post, the man whose likeness is applied towards the best friend of the main character in the book, died suddenly from a heart attack.

Life is a fickle, fleeting thing.

During “Part 1” of this series we talked about TIME and the fleeting nature of it. The loss of these two very important men within my life grinds home that truth. It also leaves me thinking how they within their own lives chose to “MAKE IT HAPPEN”.

Both were men of success. Both in business and their personal lives they thrived, overcame obstacles, and persevered in the face of impressive challenges. Both men worked hard, loved with sincerity, and built for themselves the life they felt was right for them.

Both men were young.

Arguably these two had decades of life left to enjoy. I cannot consider this reality without also considering my own perspective. How do I use my time? How much time do any of us really have left? There is no way to know conclusively, due to time and unforeseen occurrences, how life will pay out.

Again, this is not an attempt to be morbid; it is instead a call to banners of sorts. That we might stand and face this day at the ready, with a solid view toward our goal!

Do you have an IT?

Do you have a goal, a quest, an endeavor you would see to its completion? I cannot guess at yours, so to help you understand the concept behind “MAKE IT HAPPEN” I will share with you my IT.

My IT is to be accomplished in my career as a Professional Storyteller through illustration and writing. The stronger of those two skills for me is illustration, and so I started there.

At this current time I am comfortable professing I am a Professional. Yes, I am still working to capture enough business to allow me to work at this career path exclusively, leaving me room to still grow. This should always be the case for a successful, driven person. There is no plateau, there is only ever more area to grow and improve.

When I started out in 2001 I was nowhere close to where I am now. I had no idea how gigs worked, how to work with clients, I had not published anything yet, I was simply a college dropout who knew I could do more than I was. This lead me to “Step 1” in how we MAKE IT HAPPEN!

Step 1: Have a clear view of where you are and where you want to go.

This two part initial step is key to all that follow. In fact it is one of the harder steps, and not simply because it is first. It can seem easy to decide where you want to go, to decide what you want and desire, yet to best attain it we must also identify where we are. This is difficult for some because it takes humility to look at our situation with a critical and modest eye. To really know where we are at a moment is to also acknowledge ourselves in relation to all factors around us. It is to acknowledge our limits and that we are not the center of the universe.

One way to accomplish this is to write out two lists: The first list is all the facets of your life you would like to maintain, and the second is of the areas you would like to change.

With both lists in front of you look at the good list and think on what it would take maintain those items.

Now consider how the things you may hope to keep are impacted by removing the things you would like changed. This helps us see how aspects of life are connected. This will help us easily see what and how things can be cut out to free up time, energy, and resources to accomplish our goals. Use this to create a new list of only items worth keeping, cutting out any impacted or reliant on activities you opted to change.

Take this list and write out how these items you’re keeping support your goal.

Next identify the NEW changes you are going to need implement to accomplish your goal.

For example: Your IT/Goal may be to be “Healthier”, and you chose to keep your gym membership, and you had to cut out some dietary habits, or even some aux habits such as Saturday night out with friends as the wings and beer are not supportive of your goal. That left you with “home cooking” and “Gym membership”, and allows you to replace Saturday night out with a supportive activity like “meal prep for the week” or “Keep a journal”, something to keep your efforts directionally correct toward your goal of being “Healthier”.

You should at this point have an initial list that shows where you are, and where you want to be. This list should also be adjusted regularly. As you accomplish goals, readdress your accomplishments and fine tune your efforts to stay focused on your goal, your IT.

In 2001 I had to admit that I had drive, and I had the capacity to learn, but I did not have the skill set required to be a professional storyteller, to work in comic books specifically. I made my list. I began cutting out social activities, video games, and things that took up my time, and I fine tuned my life to allow me to become a student of the craft. Meaning after my day job was done, and my ‘responsibilities of life’ were fulfilled, it was on me to push myself to learn and acquire the skills I would need for this business.

I’ve had to adjust my lists, rewriting them multiple times over the years. Therein lies the principle, no one will do it for us. We have to MAKE IT HAPPEN. Does that mean we do it alone? Not at all!!

Thank you for reading!

Anthony Hary

Do you have an “IT”?

Many of us do. We call them goals, dreams, aspirations, and they can range and vary as widely as we do from person to person. This variance however is only a detail. No matter your IT you can find it a reality. To do so, first it is benefitted by truly understanding what your IT is.

Our respective IT can shift from moment to moment, varying throughout our day. IT = DESIRE. Whether that desire is the trivial day to day of physical provisions, and caring for bodily needs, or perhaps a grand aspiration that could form not just your future but those of many around you, the desire is your IT.

No matter your IT, there is really only one goal: Make IT Happen

If you follow me on social media, it will become quickly apparent that this is my mantra, my mission statement, my motto towards life. Make IT Happen!!! The saying evokes action, focus, decisiveness, and the ever forward moving approach to life that leans to accomplishment, failure, success, and fulfillment.

I am confident that regarding the smaller ITs of finding sustenance and general covering, you are well informed. For the purpose of this discussion we will focus on an IT that is directly related to one of the four pillars of success: LIFE, ART, STRENGTH, and CHARACTER.

As with anything, if you want to build something of worth you must start with the foundation, and our foundation is our LIFE. From your LIFE comes all other aspects. Uniquely, it is both our foundation, and our final product. What is LIFE? It is the foundational core of our existence as humans. Our family, friends, career, it is all those things we do and are. Perhaps your IT in LIFE is the balanced use of your move valuable asset, Time.

There is a popular quote illustrating the value of time:
“Imagine there is a bank account that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day. Every evening the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What would you do? Draw out every cent, of course?

Each of us has such a bank. It’s name is TIME.

Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest to a good purpose. It carries over no balance. It allows no over draft. Each day it opens a new account for you. Each night it burns the remains of the day.

If you fail to use the day’s deposits, the loss is yours. There is no drawing against “tomorrow.”

You must live in the present on today’s deposits. Invest it so as to get from it the utmost in health, happiness and success!

The clock is running!! Make the most of today.”

This illustration reflects for us the inescapable truth of life, and calls to light our attitude towards it. We all could benefit from a more balanced application of our time. Time to be healthier, to exercise, to spend with loved ones, to apply that time where need to accomplish a personal goal, another IT. All this is related, yet first we do well to manage our most valuable, yet uncontrollable resource. Make IT Happen!

How can you balance your Time?

Take an inventory. Where does your time go currently? Feel free to use hours and minutes by the way, makes the math much easier. Log in a notebook how much time you may be spending on any specific activity. Whether that be Work, Shopping, Entertainment, or doing nothing at all, it all costs time. Establish its cost.

With your inventory complete, make a complimentary list of where you would prefer your life to go. For example your inventory may show you’re sleeping 8 hours a day, yet losing over 10 hours per day to your job, along with the 2 hours that go towards driving to work it leaves you just 4 hours in your day for other activities. After you factor in getting ready for work, and preparing/eating dinner, what time is left? Not everything can fit into our days off either, meaning adjustments must be made. We have to Make IT Happen!

What can we do?

• Work less hours.
• Work closer to home.
• Sleep less.

Whatever we decide therein lays the principle. We have to MAKE it happen. Once we have our IT, action is then required from us. No matter what pillar of our life we are working on (LIFE, ART, STRENGTH, or CHARACTER), there is no one to do it for us. Sure we help each other, encourage each other, yet to achieve growth it is us who must grow, us who must MAKE IT HAPPEN!!!

Thank you for reading!

Anthony Hary