Is it worth doing it if others are already doing it?

 When I go out on the ice, I just think about my skating. I forget it is a competition.

               Katrina Wilt

Have you ever felt discouraged from pursuing something that you truly love because others are already doing it and you don’t believe you’ve got a snowball’s chance in hell against them?

I’m making some assumptions here.  I’m assuming that:

1. Aside from doing what you love doing, you also love an audience.  People who will appreciate what you do and engage with you.
2. You believe that you may not be as good as these already successful others
3. You believe that there are a limited number of people who would be interested in what you have to offer and the big guns have already claimed them
4. You believe you have to compete and you don’t want to

So, you give up even before you’ve started or you begin with a .  How am I ever going to pull this off???

Let me give you 6 good reasons, heck, make that 6 GREAT reasons why you should go ahead and do what you’re passionate about:

Reason One – Unless you’re using their cookie cutter and working from their heads and with their hands, what you do will be unique to you.  You have something unique to offer whether in style, content, delivery, target audience or all four.  

Reason Two – Unique is what you are and what you’re offering is.  This is your unique contribution to the wondrous and forever unfinished tapestry of life.  Life without your contribution would be life failing to express itself fully.  Do you want to take the blame for that??? J

Reason Three – You can don the competitive persona and all its combative gear but you don’t have to!  In fact, if you believe, as I do, that life is unity, then it makes absolutely no sense to compete.  

Instead, you can express yourself as freely and imaginatively as you will allow yourself, feeling assured that in self-expression, there are no *winners* and *losers*, only those who dare and those who don’t.

Reason Four – The universe is abundant.  Life on Ground Infinity is limitless.  And whilst there may be a limited number of people in the world, there will always be enough of an audience for everyone.  

Have you ever noticed how a street full of restaurants in your local Chinatown can somehow survive?  They’re all offering oriental menus to a somewhat stable number of patrons yet they can all survive.  How is that possible? 

Many of them offer similar dishes on their menu but each restaurant has its own unique appeal.  You might have your favorite and it may be many other people’s favorite too but this does not mean the death of the other restaurants.  This is something I’ve often marveled at. 

It’s the same with cafes and coffee shops.  Just along 50 meters of where I work, there are at least 6 different places that sell coffee and I know that they each have their loyal customers who will sing their respective praises! 

I don’t see the local population in this area growing.  On the contrary, it’s pretty steady.  But there seems to be enough customers to go around so that all of them are surviving and thriving!

Reason Five – When you do what you’re passionate about, the rest of the world cannot help but feel, on some level, the energy of your passion.  Some people will be affected in a way that they are conscious of and that they therefore wish to communicate with you.  These will be your obvious audience, the ones you can see or hear or engage electronically with as I do through my blogs.

There will also be many others who remain invisible, unseen and unfelt (consciously) by you.  But that doesn’t mean they do not exist or that they do not benefit in some intangible way from what you have to offer.

You have to remind yourself that our physical form is not the only form of our being.  We exist beyond our flesh and bones and are in constant communication and interaction with one another. 

Does that seem like *woo woo*, *way out there* kind of stuff?  If so, I suggest you take some time to really ponder the true nature of your being and of all beings.  

Reason Six – This is by far the most obvious one - Because you’re passionate about it, of course!  What is the point of your life if you cannot spend it doing what you want and love?  

To put all or at least some of these into context, let’s look at this blog that I’ve recently started.  If you’ve read my other blog www.thoughtbubbleten.blogspot.com, you’ll have gathered that I’m pretty passionate about blogging.

I love using the medium of writing to explore my thoughts, feelings, beliefs and ideas.  And I love having an audience, people I can engage with to share and explore their ideas and mine.  

I gathered my first few followers (about 6) within a month and then it stayed fairly stable at that number.  Sure, there were days when I felt discouraged but my love for exploring ideas just would not let me stop.  

But, there was another thing that kept me going too.  That was the quality of the comments I was receiving.  There were two or three people who really took the time to share in depth and sometimes our comments could have easily been blog posts in themselves!

When I got discouraged about not having more commenters/followers, I would happily remind myself of the amazing quality of comments I had from the few commenters who consistently showed an interest in what I had to say and sincerely shared their thoughts and experiences.  For me, that’s gold.

I don’t have a ‘rise to stardom’ story to share with you about my blogging.  I currently have 22 followers at www.thoughtbubbleten.blogspot.com and am attracting more commenters.  It’s a passion in progress J

Why did I start this blog?  Because I wanted another venue to reflect more deeply on some of my experiences as I take bigger and bolder steps on Ground Infinity.  I also want to help others take similar steps and sharing my experiences and insights is one way of doing that.

Will you find similar content on other blogs on the web?  You betcha!  But, you’ll never find what I write in my way anywhere else and that makes a difference.  This is me tasting and expressing my slice of life in the infinite tapestry of life.  This is me contributing to the fuller expression of Life. 

Will I have followers here?  People who will engage with my ideas and share their experiences and insights?  I certainly hope so!

So, if you’ve been hesitating about whether or not to do what you truly love doing, do us all a favor – JUST DO IT!  The world will truly be better for it and will rejoice in its own marvelous way at the flow of more passion through it. 

Yep, the world could do with one more passionate soul rolling in the mud and one less frustrated one howling at the moon:)