Brief Overview

No, launches are not dead. No, the sky is not falling. But if your marketing isn’t performing and you feel stuck, what do you do? You’re going to find out in this episode with the one and only, Dr. Amy Johnson.

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Q&A with Dr. Amy Johnson

Q: Dr. Amy, you’re a psychologist, so you work with clients all the time who are dealing with different challenges, right? Can you give listeners a sense of the range of issues you deal with as it relates to people who feel stuck in life? [04:29]

A: Yeah. I work with a lot of people with habits, procrastination, food-related habits, drinking habits, habits of going online and wasting time and all kinds of things like that. Things like “I know my relationships could be better” or “my business could be more fulfilling, but I’m stuck feeling the same way over and over.” It’s a really huge range.

Q: I believe there’s a big divide happening. On the one side, businesses are thriving. People are seeing year-over-year growth, launches are getting bigger and better, promotions are doing phenomenally well, business is accelerating. And then there’s this other side, where business used to be good but it’s flat lined and now it’s starting to drop off. People get stuck in this panic mindset, “like what do I do?” So, if anybody in our audience is feeling stuck—their marketing’s not working like it used to, business is not growing—what’s the first thing that you would recommend they start doing? [05:10]

A: I think the first thing is to see that you’re spinning your wheels in your own head. The more we try to think ourselves into clarity, the more of a mess we just end up making in our heads. Don’t try to make sense of it all. Let your thinking happen, because we can’t really stop it. But don’t get up there and try to figure it all out.

Q: So “don’t worry about the thinking” is the first step. But then there’s the second step, which is to do nothing. This is completely counter-intuitive for any driven person. They’re going to want to solve the problem. Would you say that’s true? [06:46]

A: Yes, this is a hard one. We’re constantly pointed, right? I mean, the reason we say “do nothing” is because when the thinking is there, if we aren’t so tuned into it trying to figure it out, it starts to fall away on its own. That’s the thing about thinking. If we pay a lot of attention to it, it’s there in a big way, and when we look away or we don’t care, it starts to fade.

It’s like one of those snow globes. You shake it up and it gets really crazy. The snow is everywhere. And that’s how our minds are often. We all know that feeling very well but the thing about a snow globe is if you want the snow to settle down, you don’t do anything. You don’t shake it the other way. You don’t unshake it. You set it down. Because the nature of the snow globe is that the snow will settle on its own. The human mind actually works exactly like that and no one really knows this. We’re so worried about ‘doing’ that we don’t realize that our minds settle on their own.

When we’re doing nothing, that’s where fresh new thinking comes up. That’s where we have breakthrough ideas or we see things differently. It comes from the quiet that’s beneath all the chaos.

Q: So, when it comes to getting unstuck, number one is stop thinking, number two is do nothing and number three is to wait for it. What does that third step mean? [08:59]

A: Everyone who’s listening can see this in any area of their life. When we just hang out in life, new thoughts are constantly showing up. We aren’t putting them there. Sometimes it feels like we’re the ones doing it. When we’re calm and more present, we get new ideas. So, it’s just about knowing that this happens and then we start to feel more comfortable looking there.

It’s really hard initially, but once people start to see that, “Oh, when I settle my mind, when I just don’t care about what’s happening up there and I just wait for it, stuff does come up.”

Q: And so, it’s having trust in that process. You and I were talking about how this is completely counter-intuitive to what most are taught in terms of how to work through the challenges that they’re experiencing—whether they feel stuck in their business, an eating disorder or a bad habit like smoking. Most people are taught it’s a problem and therefore you have to solve it with some type of solution. But that’s not what you’re suggesting here, is it? [10:19]

A: No. In fact, it’s about looking toward our natural health and resilience and when we aren’t in the way trying to fix everything and calling things problems, that comes through. Imagine that you’re baking a batch of chocolate chip cookies… You put all your ingredients together, you put them in the oven, and then they get burned. Well, you wouldn’t take the burnt cookies out and try to fix them. You don’t scrape the burn-off. You would just throw them in the garbage and start over, right? Because we know that in this made up metaphor, we have the ingredients, we have a hot oven and it’s just so much easier to put more in and more comes out. So, it’s not about trying to stop and fix every little thing and thought. It’s more of just seeing, wow, fresh, new healthy stuff comes up no matter what we’re talking about all the time.

The ideas will flow but the mind has got to settle first. Once the mind settles then the ideas will come in terms of how to begin making the right kind of progress for your particular stuckness.

Q: Okay. So, to recap for everybody, if you’re stuck right now in terms of your marketing, in terms of your business, in terms of any aspect of your life, there are three things (and these are counter-intuitive) that you need to know. Number one, stop thinking. You can’t think your way out of this problem. Number two, do nothing. Your mind has to settle. Once it settles, then the ideas will come. And number three is to wait for it. This is where you have to be patient and trust the process that the ideas will come. As we wind down, Dr. Amy Johnson, any final thoughts for everybody listening? [12:08]

A: Just that there’s a lot of hope. We all feel stuck. We do, and we’re just innocently trying to figure it all out because that’s what we’re taught to do. We’re resourceful smart people. We try to figure stuff out, but I think if we all start to just notice our minds settling down, you’ll see it.

Q: Amazing. Okay. So, where can people go to find out more about you and the work that you do? [13:29]

A: The easiest place to go is to my main website which is DrAmyJohnson.com.

Resources

DrAmyJohnson.com

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