Expert in the Rough, Brian Monahan

Photoshop is $600, GIMP is free. You make the choice.

For most of “In The Roughers” you are probably on a tight budget. GIMP is a free image editing program that will allow you to create professional blog headers and other image files.

I created the header for my personal blog Coachbriany.com with GIMP and the header for Expert in the Rough with Photoshop.

I happen to have access to Photoshop with my day job, however, if I had to purchase Photoshop I would choose GIMP in a heartbeat. This header is a combination of a header supplied with a free Wordpress Theme and IStockPhoto image. I will cover these tools in future posts.

Write what you know. This may sound obvious but it’s an easy oversight.

Of course you write what you know, but do you really? Next time you are feeling blocked ask yourself :

• What am I trying to prove?
• Who am I trying to impress?
• Am I really passionate about this topic?
• What additional research do I need to do?
• What am I afraid to say?

Your answers should help you decide how to proceed with your writings.

Feel free to abandon what you don’t know, it will help make room for sharing what you do know.

This also applies to speeches.

Stage Presence is the ability to connect with your spirit and communicate with an audience. When you have stage presence you have a connection.

Have you ever seen an act where the talent is not the best technically at their craft, but they have a great spirit and confidence.

The confidence is an elixir called charisma. We all deep down want this charisma for ourselves.

You can have stage presence in all that you do. You can develop your stage presence with practice, preparation and experience.

Since, everybody wants it why are you holding it back?

Fear I suspect.

If you are looking to develop your stage presence, I recommend Karaoke.

Fear No More!

Liberate your voice.  If you can’t get past the censor inside, you will never get past the censor in cyberspace.

A quick way to liberate your voice is to write mad.

Now try the flip side; simmer down and write nicely on the same subject.

Which one is more interesting?

So why are you writing nice?

It’s time to play the name game.  If you are going to have an expert internet presence, then you are going to need to buy the real estate.  By real estate, I mean domain names.

Now is the time to find out if your name is available as a domain name.  www.brianmonahan.com is not available.  That is my name.  www.brianPmonahan.com is what I own (notice the P for my middle name).  It’s an OK substitute but it’s no BrianMonahan.com.  I wish I had it.  I have been trying to buy it for nearly 5 years.

Don’t wait until you’re famous to buy your personal domain name, because it will probably be gone.  I recommend GoDaddy.com for domain registrations.

While you are at it go ahead and register for a gmail account and a yahoo account and so on.  They’re free and they have your name in them(you hope), what fun!

Go ahead and register for any other names you might have in mind to market your business. 

FYI, this is a great way to get some momentum for a new idea or starting your expert business. 

Play the name game this week. 

“In the Roughers” embrace the idea of transparency as a  gift.  When you share yourself without filters and express your goals, dreams and visions everybody wins.

Your transparency allows for the opportunity to inspire others and secondly for you get the gift of feedback.

Feedback then allows for you to hone your vision and refine your path or message.

This process can be never ending.

Rinse and Repeat often.

Yesterday I took a chance and shared the “Expert in the Rough” with a coworker.  I shared a link and he gave me some great feedback.  I realized if I had waited to share my blog with him till I had things just perfect I would have missed out on his great ideas.