EPI-62: Herding Satellites

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March 19, 2023

It Starts With Big Sleep

Every now and then, I sleep in an almost comatose fashion.

The loss of working time the next day often frustrates me.

But I learned long ago that these “Big Sleeps” usually result in a “Big Work” day, in which I get an incredible amount of work done, at scale.

As I pondered this reality, it reminded me of an article I wrote on my old site back in 2012.

So that’s what today’s episode became: the discussion of that article, what it meant when I wrote it and how it applies to the way I work now, both for myself and for you.

Here it is:

It’s all about herding satellites for me. As I’m developing an idea, be it to satisfy the need of a larger project, start a new project, or find a new path when it all gets too murky, I become aware of the “herd” of satellites that start coming my way.

They appear, need to be directed, and then utilized. This one thing – the herd and what to do with it – is my number one skill set.

But I can’t give it context. That’s my partner’s job

So, this is a two-parter, really. First, the herd.

I’m writing this because I feel there are many out there like me; people who have great ideas, see the bigger picture, know where to get all the parts to make it a success but can’t make it all go, once assembled.

In my mind, when I begin to tackle a problem or develop a new plan, the goal is to gather. I gather knowledge. I quiz people who are specialists in their field. I confer with those who are already successful at doing what it is I’m attempting to build.

I sit quietly and think and ponder, A LOT!

Silence is like medicine to me. I look forward to trips in my mind the way others do when they go on vacation. I can’t wait to see what inspirations and “a-ha!” moments are going to hit me as I let my mind wander. There is a deep pleasure for me in making the necessary connections between all the pieces.

This is when the actual herding begins

I am huge on metaphors. They’re my favorite way to convey an idea or explain a concept. The one that I started seeing, back when my projects started become quite large, was the satellites orbiting a planet.

The ideas, the wisdom and tips, the tools, the services and existing infrastructures, the joint venturing, my skills, and more all start to swirl around the planet that is my main goal.

They’re spread apart a bit and traveling in a wide arc around that planet. As I test certain hypotheses, learn more from people ahead of me in the game, consult with my partner(s), and do that heavy thinking that I love so much, the satellites start to tighten up their grouping.

The gravitational force of the main idea becomes stronger

Some satellites end up being removed as I realize they don’t fit or were outright incorrect for the job. The rest get prioritized based on relevance to achieving the main goal or in relation to the amount of work that will be required to get my money’s worth out of their use.

And they all start to get much closer together as the basic plan begins to make itself known. The picture gets clearer. My confidence in my ability to understand what I’ve built and my ability to convey it to key individuals connected to the plan, grows.

Then it all becomes part of the main mass

All the satellites come crashing to the surface of my “idea planet” and become absorbed – become integral, working pieces of the operational whole.

The herding is done.

Now the farming can begin

And this is where my partners come into play. Details give me a headache. More like, they tire me. I’m talking about the ins and outs of implementing all that I’ve gathered. Not my job. I’m the guy in furs who’s armed to the teeth, who hunts alone. I leave it up to the village elders as to what to do with the resources I bring back.

Maybe this is you. Maybe you’re an idea guy or girl. The abstract appeals to you more than the physical. You get the ball rolling. You scrounge, dig, and shop for what’s needed and leave the battle planning up to others.

If you’re a smart, big thinking, yet unsuccessful business person then find your other half

My main partner does what I can’t. He sells, builds the marketing plans, and strategically lays out all the little lines and details of how all the satellites I gathered will work together. The day to day routines. The ways of making the plan understandable to the various third parties involved. Turning my big idea into a functioning resource that we can sell. Helping all the satellites to understand how they will work together with one another in a way that allows everyone to win.

So, don’t give up if you’re that dreamer – that smart, interesting person who everyone likes but whose life no one envies. The person whom everyone admires in some vague way but is pitied or ridiculed by those same people, behind your back.

I’ve been there and seen it all. But I found the one satellite that had been furthest from my reach – the person who makes my abstract value a tangible commodity. You’ll find yours too, once you understand that you need one. Took me 15 years. You might want to save yourself some time and frustration and find yours quicker.

Transcript

Just click the “READ MORE” text below for the transcript!

Welcome fellow trauma survivors. This is episode 63. Let’s take our pain pro. It’s like difference. Did you catch that? Big difference happening over here.

Down in the pod pit. I have changed the focus of this show from 1 of purely bipolar. I’ve expanded it to well here’s the new my line helping trauma survivors create an online business to share their story. Why the big switch can?

Hang on big cough. I don’t know if I’ll edit that out or not. That thing’s been bothering me for a while. I think maybe you enjoy it with me, the relief I felt. There is a lot going on this weekend this past week.

I’ve been in my head quite a bit It’s it’s why I did that last episode herding satellites. I believe that was my subconscious kind of pushing through into the podcast made me think of that.

The ideas and my plans, they swirl around my head dipping in and out almost like a bug light before they land and become part of my whole become part of, you know, whatever it is I’m about to do next.

I think that’s why I did that last episode. Now on this episode, I should say this week, oh man, so many things are bothering me bothering me right now.

Even in this house as I’m trying to create this episode, there is so much shit going on that I hope doesn’t get picked up on the mics.

And is breaking my attention because there’s just been a lot going on just this weekend with this show and the online machine that I had to edit all over the place to fit my new approach.

It’s not that much different but 1 of the things was I honestly was struggling to talk about the money making aspect of sharing 1 story.

I brought that up in the past but I I never could I couldn’t I couldn’t get my head around like, why is this so tough to talk about?

We all need money. We’re all trying to get paid for what we do. I’m trying to put the dream situation together of getting paid to do what it is I love doing best. That’s this show and the website and everything about it, the coaching.

So why is that so damn hard to talk about? Now I feel the way I had to show up to this point was with such a focus on helping people heal from bipolar or or helping high functioning people to build something off the back of bipolar.

It was it was all bipolar. It was purely focused on bipolar. That was 2 niched down, niched, niched, It was too fine a point. It was limiting what I wanted to say and how I wanted to proceed. How I wanna live my life.

Even in my day to day life, I bring up my story in the in the day job I have and then just in talking with people there is a time and place when I can make mention of my bipolar past, but it’s it’s almost like an aside it’s awful grim to bring it up at most times and, you know, it just doesn’t fit.

It doesn’t fit socially And then even when I’m doing something that’s sort of related to mental health, it’s I don’t even feel like talking about it all the time.

Not about all the ins and outs. I use I use it strategically to prove points to give context to let other people know I understand their pain.

And there’s things I learned in fighting bipolar that just had me it forced me to change how I live my life period. So I think about these things sometimes.

I’m talking to people just on the on the day to day but in general I’m pretty tired of bipolar. I beat it a long damn time ago. 20 almost 20 years now. And yet, I’m very proud of what I did. I’m still blown away by what I did.

I’m blown away by the bipolar years. I’m blown away by the years that preceded it because it was so much bizarre. Oddness. You know before it even got bad and then when it got bad forget about it. It was just pure insanity at times.

And then what I went through after like I’m still I’m proud of it. I’m enamored. Buy it with it? Not sure what follows enamored there. But I don’t mind it per se but I don’t live it entirely and everything I do all the time.

I didn’t even wanna keep calling the show a bi pole or anything. I wanted to go something a little broad And I probably will at some point. That’s that’s the way my site was. My old site some years back was outsiders’ journey.

It’s still alive but I got it hidden Part of why I made this move besides my own discomfort and getting fed up would not be able to talk about the things I really wanted to talk about which is making money online, building an online business off the back of my story.

I got tired of just keeping too many things in and getting confused when they would enter my mind as I was making this show. So I’m I’m not I’m not bothered that anymore.

I’ll probably lose some listeners over that but I think even if you’re a bipolar person, right? I’m not looking to coach bipolar people into wellness. I’ve said that time and again, That’s like doctoring stuff. That’s not where I’m at.

I’m a coach. I’m rallying the troops to take the hill. Doctors are saving people. I don’t want to save anyone. I want to work with people that are somewhat stable. I don’t want them to be all the way stable. Where’s the fun in that?

But they’re stable as far as what we all understands, you know, how to get a life done, they’re stable. And I wanna push those people onwards and upwards to do great things with whatever it is that makes them interesting.

I’ve said all that before too but still, I had these things these restraints on myself that III didn’t know what to do with them.

So anyway now we’re this new thing. But if you’re a bipolar, I would say you still want to check-in with the show because you want to see what a former bipolar persons up to.

And even though I’m former, I still feel whatever I don’t know what part but but some part of bipolar still flavors me.

I don’t have the illness. There’s nothing about me that I can go into a doctor’s what’s in store, into a doctor’s office and they can pen bipolar.

Just there’s nothing. So so now I’ve gone a little larger by helping other trauma survivors do the very same thing I’m doing with this by with this podcast and the website.

The funny thing is also in my daily life, where appropriate. It usually isn’t because because most people are just happy to go to work or or resigned. I never was.

Neither of those things, but every now and then I get somebody that wants to build a small business or or even just take a really wild leap into a larger career path that’s practically the same amount of stress, same amount of fear, same amount of risk.

I love helping those people see a way through those issues to become something greater than what they are.

I absolutely love it. It’s what I talk about the most the loudest and and I I strive to find moments in my life where someone will give me that window. Like, I stay open to it, I should say. That makes more sense.

So part of what took me down this path was Dan Co K0E. He talked about how you start 1 way and then he said as long as you Give about 20 percent of your material is still on the original point which for me is bipolar.

The rest you can talk about anything you want and you should be. You shouldn’t be hammering away at 1 single thing.

Now if you step back here and tell you you’re gonna hear Here’s another thought that’s in my head all the time. The 2 sides of a coin, you are going to hear as you try to build something like what I’m building.

You’re gonna hear completely diametrically opposite advice. Both of which pieces of advice are completely valid rational and and you’d wanna do them, but they oppose 1 another. I have been doing this so long online.

I’ve studied under so many people either directly or just passively consuming material in their website or newsletter. It’s very hard to figure out who to listen to when and why. My 1 of my my my oldest coach Jason Leister.

Jason he had told me some time back. He’s like don’t go too small because then you’re stuck right there. The very last coach that I paid to help me come up with a high functioning bipolar people said the opposite.

You you wanna go just for these very specific people because they’re your people. What you say directly impacts them so strongly.

They know you’re your people and they will pay to have you coach them. Both those things are true. They’re both true. But what I’m finding is trying to constrain myself to just talking to and finding high functioning bipolar people.

It was strangling me. Now, I know they’re out there. I’m still gonna talk to high functioning bipolar. Of course, I am. This still fits.

This fits exactly I’m just letting in the other trauma survivors as well because again particularly with my day job, I have met more people that have overcome shit just as nightmarish as what I went to with bipolar and and and some of them had bipolar and some didn’t have it at all.

They had completely different sources of pain.

I am amazed at what people can overcome. And it’s it’s just it’s interesting. It’s bipolar was so disgusting. It was weird in a disgusting fashion. And it was packed with fear huge huge huge fear.

The likes of which a A sane person will never know. You need to be something like bipolar for that part of your brain to kick in the gear. And then you will You will know of fear the likes of which.

It’s thermonuclear. Everything up to that point has been BB guns and small caliber rifles coming at you. Not nuclear bombs. So we all think the thing we’re in is the worst and I have to keep reminding myself.

It’s just an it’s just a thought, it doesn’t impact anything. There’s other people that have gone through things I never went through that sound just as bad to me and they pulled through. They listen to what I say.

They can’t even fucking imagine the bizarre side effects that happened with bipolar and, you know, my 3 to my 3 to 4 hour long panic attacks shit like that, but like people can’t even imagine, of course you couldn’t.

But then I couldn’t imagine a lot of those things I’ve met or heard about from people that have lived on the streets just just that or the drug addicts how how far down the hole they get particularly what’s out there now for them to assume whether they know it or not, they weren’t into problems that are just as colossal, just as life almost ending and and and negative and I want all of them in here telling their story.

1 of the things I picked up on I was able to piece together was I frequently would want someone on my podcast to tell their story but their story frequently They had nothing to do with bipolar.

I couldn’t help myself. It was like a knee jerk reaction when I when I heard someone’s story. I’m like you should be on my podcast.

But since I was only aiming at high functioning bipolar people who have AAA passion they want to turn into a larger mission, Most people don’t have any of that and yet their stories are magnificent for the good and the bad.

I wanted them on the podcast. And then I’d wonder, well how am I gonna make sense it out?

How am I gonna shoehorn that into the show? So that it’s fair to my listeners who were there as high functioning bipolar people or something very similar. And then so I ended up not as you may have noticed almost no guests.

The guests I had that were bipolar. I was trying. What do I know about interviews anyway? I, you know, I had some and they were good and I’ve been interviewed which is way easier than for me than giving an interview.

I tried to get those people to tell me what what what they thought might have been the positives and bipolar for them. And it was very clear in in the interviews that I did and none of them felt anything was positive.

I knew that then but then I sat on it for many month many many months thinking about what that meant to the progression of my show and my business.

I knew something I mean it was clearly off because they didn’t I don’t think they agreed with me. They were being polite about it but they didn’t agree that there was positives.

What I was getting at now, I see. At at least to this degree, was their strength. Just their strength. This illness can kill people. I read once somewhere that it it’s the most suicidal illness there is.

I don’t know. Don’t come at me for that if it’s wrong or, you know, maybe it was right 1 time and it no longer is. I don’t know. I know it’s gotta be in the top 3 after what I lived through. I don’t know how I didn’t end.

But these people interviewed, they they they weren’t seeing the positives. Now that’s partly because I could see the positives in them that they don’t know but they don’t care because they don’t they’re just glad it’s over.

And then they went on to do something different, whereas I address the illness directly as a path forward for marketing and building a business and helping people.

They did completely different things except for 1 of them and but again even that person didn’t see any positive in it, it just needed to end, be eradicated.

So all of this together just has been digging at me and and Interesting side note, my human design chart says I I go there’s a few major pieces to it, but 1 of them is how you make your decisions.

And in my case, this actually, you you wouldn’t think it’s so, but I go with my gut. I feel it. I physically feel if something’s a hell yeah or a hell no in my gut.

And I’ve not been feeling that bipolar excellence has been hell yeah for a little bit now and I’ve been trying to make things fit and not liking what it meant and I’m I’m getting ready.

I thought it was gonna happen this weekend but then I had to make this shift so I had to redo a lot of images and and copy all over the place in different places where I was, you know, where I I market myself.

I had a update to the new mission, so I didn’t get to the the LinkedIn marketing machine that I’m about to turn on.

I did get into the course and start reviewing it because it’s it’s a bit to get your head around, but I have it now and I’ve seen enough examples on LinkedIn.

Everybody follows sort of the same format. There’s more to it than that but, you know, I get the gist of it and the time my head works, the longer I sit in something it becomes clear even if I’m not working on it, directly.

So I wanted that to get going because I am reaching a point where I don’t know how much longer I can tolerate remaining employed.

That does not mean I’m gonna become bipolar. I’m not going to have an event. I’ll just I’ll have to do something drastic like quit or or take some other new job and I’m I’m all out of trying new jobs.

This has to happen for my sanity. And I know it will. I’ve known for quite some time at will. I know too much about how things work online. I have no fears. I just need it to happen quicker than it did.

You will hear everybody say that about their business. I’m not alone there. But just based on you know I’m older. I’m older than most of the people I learned from. I’ve I’ve had more years to run out steam than them.

They’re younger. They can keep going. I’m pretty much done. At the same time, I am blown away by what I have built online and where I know it’s headed next and and I have I have no fears. But I have to stay on point and I have been.

I worked. Yesterday, I’m back to work full time, which sucks. After my dad died, I took this thing called family medical leave. And I was working 3 days a week with partial pay since August. And separate from my dad dying.

I worked for over 4 months straight just just getting his estate all all straightened out in helping my mom who’s in her mid seventies just do a lot plus we were both dealing with the loss of my dad which sucked because he was fucking awesome.

And and Now I’m back to working full time and that was that was a dramatic, that was a car crash in my head and my heart. I’m doing it but I’m even unhappier about it than I thought I’d be. So this is driving me.

This is driving me to push even harder than already was. Yesterday, I’ve been getting up early in the morning and instead of working late at night. That seems to be helping. That’s surprising. I didn’t see that coming. I’m a night guy.

But I’ve been getting up real early instead and then going to bed very soon after getting home and that that seems to be working. In Saturday, I put in Oh my god, I put in about 14, 15 hours at my desk just working on all of this stuff.

Revamping it for the new mission statement. And then and I was pumped. I just kept pushing through. I I had many points where I just hit up, you know, I’d seize.

My brain would seize and and I would get kind of depressed even. I’m like, I just I can’t. Now I gotta fucking rebuild this page and then I’d I’d do something and then I click something on that page.

I’m like, okay, and that’s done and it goes somewhere else like, oh shit, that one’s connected. I gotta fix all the words on that 1 now. It was like that kind of a thing. But Even as those moments hit, they wouldn’t last very long.

I just kept assaulting my my will to complete these tasks. I I just kept assaulting the situation and The 1 of the good things about doing what I’ve been doing so long is even when you can’t stand it, it’s muscle memory.

You start the words come the way you want the page to look comes, then the thing you gotta learn the new shit you gotta learn on the new software, you learn it faster than ever before. I’ve been doing this too long to fail.

I’ve been doing this too long to even get in my own way for very long. So If you’re listening to the show purely out of a state of being bipolar and you have not gone to bipolar excellence dot com, you should.

Go there. It’s gonna say different things now. It’s not gonna address dealing with bipolar directly, but on the homepage where you can sign up from a newsletter.

I now I still nothing changed as far as the guts. You still get the system that I created for beating bipolar without without meds and it’s just I’m giving it away for a different reasons net reason now, but it’s still there.

So have at it. And I’m gonna always leave that there because that was a that was a thing I decided no matter what. I wanted people suffering with this thing to be able to get my information for free.

The problem is when you offer something for free no matter how off, awesome it is, people are trained in their heads to think free is shit. Nope. My thing is awesome. It’s an entire system I should be selling.

I’m not gonna. But if you are bipolar I’d I’d really want you to to take a look at it but just keep in mind the whole the whole thrust of the show now is creating an online business to share your story as a trauma survivor.

So you’re gonna want If if your if your aims purely bipolar, you’re gonna have to you’re gonna just have to adjust and do like I do.

There are people I follow online where there’s 1 or 2 or 3 things about them that I absolutely adore or need to know. And I will never hire them. I’m not interested in their larger missions.

Some of mine don’t even know what the hell they’re talking about sometimes. I can’t remember why I signed up. But I know there was a reason and I hang a little like weeks later they say something like that was fucking awesome.

So I’m glad I hung out with that guy, that girl, whatever. And and I could be that guy for those of you that are just purely fighting bipolar.

And if nothing else I made it out and I turned it into all of this. You might want to follow along just for the sense of maybe you don’t have to do what I did but I got out.

Maybe just following along with me offers something that helps at least to keep you going and to keep trying and and to lessen your nightmare if if possible.

But for everyone else I I am now all inclusive with the pain. If you survived Anything hideous. I want to talk to you. I want to work with you.

So come over to bipolarexcellence dot com. Get on the newsletter list, get my free system because you’re gonna need it because my system is good for anybody trying to do anything and keep their head about them and and be healthy.

You know, bipolar doesn’t need to be in a picture at all to to benefit from what I offer. I’ve been saying that for almost 20 years since I built the damn thing everybody should be doing some version of what I put in that system.

And honestly, if you follow any health and wellness people, most of what I say they’re doing something awful similar.

I just have very particular products and services I found that don’t get hardly any airtime that even other wellness people aren’t talking about.

We’re talking about the same kind of general plan. We just have specific tools. You’re gonna want to see the ones I found.

And you don’t have to pay to see them just get on the newsletter. For you podcast listeners, go over to Apple and give me a nice big many starred review. So that more people get the word about what I’m doing and well, that’s it.

That is my time. So Stay tuned. I’m feeling a lot better about this. Maybe you’re picking up on that energy. And for now, this the site still remains bipolar excellence as does this show.

That could shift some time, but right now I got enough on my plate. I’m I don’t feel like turning over 1 more, you know what I’m saying. Alright, guys. Talk soon. Oh and be well.