Bren Ryder

Day 8

I got up early, got my hour in first thing, went to work and came home and caught up on little things. It was a very positive day. Inspiring. Well, it was only half a day of work and the sun was shining so it was completely lovely.

Day 9

My goal for this experiment was to change the self-defeating belief that I didn’t have enough time in my day to get all the important work done on the business. Part of that experiment was to repeat the phrase, “I have a lot of time in my day”. And, wow, I am a lot more powerful than I thought I could be. As of today, I really do have a lot of time in my day. I was fired from my day job.

Day job over. Experiment over. No more condensed one hour days. It’s time to kick this shit into gear. Now, I have to make this work. I have to make this work make money. Or I don’t eat.

Day 4

Totally back on track today. I got the precious hour done first thing in the morning. It’s such a great start to the day. An intensely focused hour of doing only the work that will move the business forward. At one point I was checking something and caught myself and realized I wasn’t using the time as planned and immediately got my focus back.

And I’m actually saying that sentence: “I have a lot of time in my day”. I have it written down on an index card on my desk to remind me. I think I’m noticing the difference. The day doesn’t simply disappear when I’m conscious of the time that is there.

The most painful part of truly feeling all that time in my day is experiencing the agony of my day job. It’s taking everything I have in my to keep this job. I’m not sure if that’s laziness or if that’s a sign that I shouldn’t be doing that job or what, but for now I need to eat and pay for a roof over my head. I’m incredibly grateful that I have a job and that I can count on money coming in every two weeks. Someday I won’t need it, but for now I do. I accept that. Someday I’ll look back on this time with nostalgia. It’s the end of an era. It’s a simple life. The life of a window cleaner.

Day 5-7

Today was the first day of completely going off the rails. If I was following the habit forming “rules” then I’d have to start over and begin again at Day 1. The idea is that once you have successfully done 30 days of your preferred behaviour then the habit has been formed. I’ve only done the 30 day experiment once before and that was to form a habit to get up at 6am everyday. I did it. I got up everyday at 6am for 30 days straight. The habit didn’t exactly stick, but it’s a lot easier for me to get up then whenever I need to and I do intend to set up that habit again in the future.

For my experiment on changing my beliefs - from “I have no time” to “I have a lot of time in my day” - and squeezing all my most important work into one hour per day, I am going to keep going for the next 30 days. I want to stick with it. I’m not going to start over. I’m doing to observe myself over this time and keep trying to re-focus my attention on changing my beliefs and getting my important work done.

Tomorrow is another day. So far, I’ve learned that to get the most out of my “work hour” i need to do it before I go off to my day job. That’s not an easy task, but it’s incredibly effective. That’s what I’m going to try this week, everyday.

Day 1

I admit it. On my first day I cheated. I worked more than an hour. But the nearly two hours that I worked today felt really productive and focussed on what was essential work. Plus, I “worked” all day (I put that in quotes because I’d prefer to think of my work as what I do for Good Dyke Porn, not the 8 hours of window cleaning that I was referring to) and I had down time. It was a beautiful day.

As for the positive affirmation, I didn’t say it out loud three times. Well, actually, I did. I whispered it this morning, said it out loud on my way home from “work” and now as I’m about to go to bed… I’ll say it right now. There three times out loud. It feels a bit awkward saying a phrase outloud to myself, but it feels powerful at the same time. I have my essential tasks set up for tomorrow and I’m excited to get my work done - one hour at a time. As I get deeper into truly condensing work into a shorter time frame, I know my answer to accomplishing this is going to be.. to delegate.

Day 2

I got my hour in first thing in the morning and I am very glad of that. I am slowly starting to believe myself when I say (outloud) that I have plenty of time in my day. However, the last portion of my day was so unproductive that I feel incredibly relieved that I got that work in first thing in the morning. The great thing about this hour of work that I am doing is that the work that I have to do is VITAL work. It’s the work that needs to be done to move the business forward, to make money. I don’t spend this hour organizing my files or anything administrative. Only important business emails are allowed. And no planning during this time - only doing.

Besides working at this experiment to eliminate the self-defeating belief that I don’t have enough time, another important belief change is that I need a lot of time to get my work done. This “work hour” is intense and I get a lot of work done, but only what’s important. The only thing left to do for today is to decide what my most important tasks are for tomorrow morning.

Day 3

I didn’t do my “work hour” this morning before the work shift and damn it, but didn’t that just blow the whole day for working. Well, my task was just to put in one hour of work this evening and unfortunately that didn’t happen. It’s unbelievable how other tasks and persistent procrastination gets in the way of working on something that is so important to me.

The purpose of this experiment was to change my belief that I don’t have enough time to do everything. Turns out I have tons of time, but I don’t seem to be using it wisely. But, for now, I’m intending to focus on creating that time in my day. Tomorrow I will be sure to get that “work hour” over and done with first thing in the morning and continue to tell myself that I have a lot of time in a day.

After working my day job I am going to k.d. lang with two ex-girlfriends, so I’m not going to have time to work in the evening. And I won’t want anything weighing on me when I leave for the evening. The morning has to be my time to get the essential work done. I’m now going to review my tasks for that hour and makes sure that everything I’m doing is immediately vital to the success of the business.

I have a lot of time in my day. Believe it. It’s only Day 3.

For my work as a pornographer, I am doing everything I can to change people’s beliefs about porn. A lot of people believe that to create porn is to take advantage of women, to exploit sexuality for the purpose of making money, with no concern for the impact of the models who expose themselves.

Of course, some of that does actually exist in porn, but the winds of change are blowing.
Now, as a business owner and contributor to this burgeoning porn movement I am keeping in mind what I want to accomplish. I want to earn a living. I want to create positive images of women expressing their sexuality. I want to make a difference.

So here I am, less than one year into the life of Good Dyke Porn and the negative beliefs about porn are the least of my worries when it comes to overcoming obstacles.

Since I still have a day-job while I continue to get the word out to the world about what we’re doing at GoodDykePorn.com, my biggest self-defeating belief is that I don’t have enough time to get everything done. When I tell myself everyday, all day that I can’t market more because I don’t have time or I can’t make changes to the site because I don’t have time or I can’t engage in forum discussion because I don’t have time or… you name it and I will apply my self-defeating belief to prevent me from getting things done.

But, there is some truth to this, right? There are only so many hours in a day. But, that last sentence itself is a self-defeating belief. When I tell myself that I don’t have time, then I don’t have time. That is how our world works. We’ve been taught differently. We’ve been taught to believe in what we see. Therefore, when I get home from the day-job, putter around the house, connect with people, prepare for the next day, rest and relax, try to get some work done, fail miserably, then go to bed, I repeatedly take on the belief that I don’t have enough time - entirely based on my observation. But what if we switch it around? What if I believe that I have MORE than enough time to make this business work? If my suspicions are correct, then that belief will beget a day with more time. At the very least, a day with enough time.

I am going to start an experiment. In this experiment I am going to eliminate two self-defeating beliefs:

1. I don’t have enough time to turn GoodDykePorn.com into a success while working a day job.
2. I need to put in A LOT of time to make GoodDykePorn.com a success.

I am a fan of personal development books and blogs and one of my favorites is zenhabits.net, which focuses on simplifying life and achieving your goals one habit at a time. The most important step in making a behaviour a habit is to do it for 30 consecutive days. This is what I am going to do.

• Starting Monday, June 9th, I will say out loud, “I have a lot of time in my day. ” I will say it in the morning, at “day end” and before going to sleep. That’s it.
• Starting Monday, June 9th, I will spend one hour everyday on the business (not including shooting days).

That may sound crazy to some people - to spend such little time on the business and expect to see any progress. But, it’s just an experiment. I have this powerful belief that I need to spend an exorbitant amount of time in front of my computer in order to make this business work. That belief creates a lot of resentment around working at my day job. Also, that belief is contrary to my goal of working less over time, not more. So, let’s eliminate these self-defeating beliefs and see what happens. I think I will be surprised at my own ability to get things done in less time. Stay tuned, you too might be surprised at what can happen with a little positive affirmation and daily habits.