Leap Over Your Plateaus With 4 New Ways of Thinking
By Heather Robson, AWAI-trained copywriter

On your way to becoming a top-notch copywriter, you're bound to hit periods where you feel stalled … stuck on a plateau.

For whatever reason, your forward momentum disappears, and you're left standing still.

However, if you know what to do when you hit one of these professional roadblocks, you can quickly overcome that loss of momentum. Often, you'll come through it refreshed and with more energy and focus than ever.

Just use one – or all – of the following four strategies to get yourself and your career back on track.

Strike the Word "Try" From Your Vocabulary

According to Ph.D.s Joy and Steve Gurgevich, writing in "Alternative Medicine," your subconscious does not understand the word "try." You either "do" or you "don't." But you cannot "try."

If, for example, I ask you to "try" to pick up a large rock that's on the ground in front of you, here's what happens: You lean over. You grasp it. You strain … then you pick it up.

There is no "trying" involved.

The point is, when you say to yourself, "I 'try' to write four pages of copy each day," you're giving yourself a mixed signal that sabotages your goal.

Here's what I do instead: I say to myself, "I write four pages of copy each day." Even if I'm not able to accomplish that goal every day, I've found that it isn't long before I really am doing what I say I'm doing.

Keep It Positive

Positive statements about what you have to do to achieve your goals work better than negative ones. They keep you focused and give you incentive, rather than make you feel like you're punishing yourself.

When I'm tempted to say to myself, "I won't waste time on the Internet today," I'm giving myself the message that I can't do what I really want to do (hang out on the Internet).

Instead, I make positive statements: "I will write for two hours this morning before taking a break." Or, "I will write 20 headlines today."

And here's an example that made a huge difference for me. When I first started writing, I would say, "I'm learning to be a copywriter." Then I turned that statement into the affirmative and started saying, "I am a great copywriter … who's learning how to get to the top!"

Visualize the Achievement of Your Goals

When you visualize what you want to accomplish, you give yourself encouragement to succeed. And you remind yourself of your priorities.

Here's how to do it. Sit down with a bunch of magazines and look through them for images of the way you want your life to be. Cut them out and glue them to a poster board.

Put this collage where you can see it while you work. Instant visualization … and a constant reminder of why you're writing four pages of copy every day.

Bite Off Less Than You Can Chew

We frequently lose momentum when our projects overwhelm us. The way to avoid this is to change our focus from the "big project" and think, instead, about the next small task we need to accomplish to move closer to success.

Let's say your most important project is to mail a self-promo piece to 100 prospects. Pick the date you want to mail it, and work backward from there. If, for example, you give yourself a month to get the job done, you might set the following deadlines:

Mailing printed by Day 28
Copy reviewed by Day 21
Copy written by Day 18
Copy outlined by Day 1
Research done by Day 5

So your first task, on Day 1, might be to make a list of 100 prospects. Easily accomplished. Your task for Day 2 would be to research client information for the first 25 names on your list … and so on.

By working this way, you take the pressure of completing whole project off your shoulders, and you trade it for the satisfaction of achieving one small, manageable task. Followed by another achievement the next day … and another the next.

By putting these four strategies to work, you can quickly push yourself through any career-stalling plateau and move forward. You'll waste less time spinning your wheels, and far more time shaping the life of your dreams.

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Published: June 11, 2007