Humans have a luscious part of our brains that allow for creative, strategic, future thinking and exercising this, with daydreaming and imagination helps us strategise for the change we want to create in the world.

I run my business from home. It’s Stan Lab and I alone, most of the time, with my wonderful developer, Jay, working alongside, remotely, from his base in the Philipines. Our core work is servicing our lovely clients – keeping their sites updated, building out new content and new sites as needed. This is rewarding, busy work. It pays the bills, gives me joy and keeps our clients businesses moving, selling, informing, bringing in leads. The bulk of this is not strategy work – it’s busy, familiar work and even new challenges are met in a familiar way, through our step by step processes and efficiencies.

On a VERY simplistic level, (full transparency: as a neuro-scientist, I’m a very good web developer) this is crocodile brain work: the ritual displays of the web development team, the product of our reptilian brains, that keeps us functioning on a familiar level.

I’m concurrently building out a business model that requires deeper strategy and thinking – writing new processes, imagining new problems and solutions for being the best Personal Brand website builder and client support in the world and possibly the universe. For this, I need to exercise imagination and daydreams – to go beyond the familiar, out into the imagined and untethered.

This is where Stan truly plays his part. He selflessly keeps me to a strict schedule of twice daily walks. The rhythm of putting one step in front of the other at a satisfying human pace while Stan collects neighbourhood news and pee-mails is the product of the neocortex taking over. I’m able to walk, think, breathe, cross roads safely, keep Stan safe from cats AND imagine, plan, strategise and, on return, implement.

Daydreaming and imagining allows us to make change happen. To plan a future, to plot the point on the horizon to which to sail. The reptile brain may call loudly to bring us back into the familiar safety of the path we are treading (that’s its job: familiarity = safety = self preservation)- that deep groove we may be caught in, but exercising your imagination more and more makes it stronger, more agile, more fruitful and easier to get out of the comfort zone. Allowing your mind to open to whatever may be possible, allowing thoughts to come and narratives to write themselves helps you build the future you want. Businesses that are successful and profitable have strategy and vision time. Your Personal Brand is where you can step into this vision and state your intention for your future.

Website building, not neuroscience, is my superpower, so while this is not science, it’s a reminder that filling your days with the same things, the same busy work, is hardwired in us. To go on a journey, imagine and then implement is the challenge, but we can build up muscle with practice and application.

My Personal Brand Workshop can help you tap into the unfamiliar and the uncharted. Over 90-minutes, I’ll ask questions that will about your values, your hopes, your current coordinates and your future plans, what is working, what you’d like to change and help you develop copy and content for your Personal Brand website that will start you on the course to a Brand New You.

I had a vague-ish idea of what I wanted to offer and where my strategic direction was going, but I had trouble pinpointing the finer details of my’ personal brand’. Through her fine-tuned process, Jude was able to break through my rambling and pull out some gems of information for me to focus on.

I think of her workshop as an anchor to a fly-away kite (which would be me). Jude was kind, caring and patient, and the report she provided me at the end gives me an excellent basis to expand upon as my brand develops.”

–Natalie Olsen, Strategic Copywriter (Natalie Olsen Copy + Content)