Is it a good idea… or an ADHD distraction ?
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I write this after one of the most intense 2 weeks of my year. My lovely Irish family came to visit, and I wanted to give them the best experience as it was the first time my husband’s family had visited Malaysia. This meant I dedicated 2 weeks to playing tour guide while also pulling my little girl out of nursery so they could spend as much time with her as possible. I was more than happy to do so, of course! Unfortunately, halfway through their visit, my beloved grandfather passed away. It was a profoundly spiritual experience. One I was privileged enough to witness. Although I am feeling grief and sadness, I feel so grateful he is no longer in pain, and I got to hold his hand, pray for him in his last moments, and say goodbye. After spending zero hours working on and in my business and saying farewell to my Irish family last night, I noticed my brain fell into a familiar (toxic) loop of self-doubt and questioning my decisions- this always happens when I am tired, overwhelmed, and behind with work. At 3 am, the question my annoying brain presented me with was this : How do you know if a new idea is actually a good idea… or just another ADHD distraction? More specifically, is my new Snail Mail subscription business another ADHD idea pulling me away from my main business, and am I wasting my time trying to build something new from scratch? Because I have a LOT of ideas. And when I get excited about one, I don’t just think: “Ooh, that could be fun.” My brain goes: THIS IS IT. This is THE thing. (then I harass my husband by telling him about this new amazing idea over dinner, poor guy O_O) And a few months ago, one of those ideas became Sparkles of Joy. At the time, I’d lost a lot of my passion for writing for Out & Beyond. I’d been blogging for years, over 8 years, in fact. It had given me an incredible life and business, but I wasn’t excited to sit down and write another SEO blog post or design another pin for Pinterest. I knew what I needed to do to grow the business, but there was a small (actually large) issue: I just couldn’t bring myself to do it . I didnt want to anymore, I’d lost my passion and zest for it. I felt creatively constipated. Can you relate? I wanted to make something. CREATE stuff from my brain that I could touch and hold. Write personal letters. Create little packages. Talk about books and life and the things I was learning. Build a community. So I started a snail mail club. And honestly? I loved it. I felt my spark and enjoyment return – I truly enjoyed creating! I learned how to make physical products. I learned the ins and outs of shipping and delivering physical mail I started learning how to grow an audience on social media instead of relying on Google. I learned about subscriptions, recurring revenue, retention, and churn. Then I had to pause everything recently, and I lost momentum. Some people canceled, which is normal in a subscription business, but I didn’t grow subscribers because I didn’t post anything about it at all! I ignored all DMs, tags, and questions about it. Total radio silence. I’ve barely worked on Sparkles of Joy for the last two weeks because we’ve had family visiting and I’ve been hosting, looking after my daughter, and generally just… living life. And when I saw the number dropping, an uncomfortable thought crept in: Was Sparkles of Joy actually a good business idea? Or did I just get bored with my old business and chase something shiny? And THAT sent me down a rabbit hole. Because I think this is something a lot of people with ADHD struggle with. We are very good at getting excited about possibilities. A new business. A new project. A new hobby. A new strategy. A new way we’re DEFINITELY going to organize our lives from Monday onwards. 😂 The beginning is intoxicating. The harder part is knowing which ideas deserve to become something. So I sat down and worked through it. Here’s my answer : I’ve realized that maybe the question isn’t: “Is this a good idea?” It’s: “Is this a good idea for me to pursue right now?” When something new grabs my attention, I run it through five questions, heres how I applied it to my snail mail idea: 1.Does it move one of my existing goals forward? If it succeeds, does it actually get me where I want to go? –For me, I get to write, which I love, and teach lessons in my snail mail, and it helps me earn too. And learn new skills – which are all big goals of mine. Ok, next question. 2. What will I have to stop or delay to do it? Every new project has an opportunity cost, even if it only takes mental attention. — I would be delaying work on my blogs, which I was struggling to work on anyway due to lack of motivation. So that was fine by me 🙂 3. Am I excited about doing the boring 80%? Imagine the admin, customer service, repetition, marketing, bookkeeping, and month six-not just launching it. It’s easy to fantasize about having 1,000 members. It’s another thing entirely to pack 1,000 envelopes. Every. Single. Month. 😂The real test of an idea isn’t whether you enjoy imagining the outcome. It’s whether you’re willing to live with the process. –Every exciting opportunity has its downside. A high-paid job, a sexy fun remote job, a lucrative business, being a rich trust fund baby (ha, I wish ! ) … whatever, every good has a bad side. But which bad are you willing to take on? And is the good worth it? 4. Would I still want this in two weeks? Put the idea in an “idea parking lot” and deliberately don’t act on it. Novelty often cools; worthwhile ideas tend to remain interesting. –Admittedly I didn’t do this -__-. I launched it 2 days after the idea. But its been 3 months and it still interests me, so thats a good sign right? 5. Can I test it without building a whole new thing? Before a website, logo, account, course, inventory, etc., find the smallest possible experiment that tells you whether people actually want it. 6. What am I learning even if it doesn’t work? This question has changed how I think about Sparkles of Joy. Maybe I grow it to 100 members. Maybe 500. Maybe one day I have the 1,000 members I keep dreaming about. Or maybe I don’t. But I’ve already learned things from building it that I probably wouldn’t have learned if I’d just kept doing what I already knew. I’m learning social media. I’m learning how to build a membership. I’m learning retention. I’m learning how to sell something nobody is searching Google for. And perhaps one day I’ll bring all of those lessons back to Out & Beyond and teach them. So was Sparkles of Joy an ADHD distraction? I don’t think I know the answer yet. But perhaps I don’t need to. Maybe entrepreneurship isn’t about perfectly predicting which ideas will succeed. Maybe it’s about learning which ideas deserve enough time to find out. And for now, I’m still curious enough about this one to keep going. For the joy of it 🙂 But I’d love to know — how do YOU tell the difference between an idea worth pursuing and another shiny new distraction? Have you ever nearly given up on something, only to realize you were just tired, overwhelmed, or going through a hard season? Hit reply and tell me. I genuinely want to know, because I’m still figuring this one out too. Thanks for reading Aisha Preece from Outandbeyond.com PS: I share my bare minimum low-effort strategy to grow my blogs on my Instagram stories — if you want more behind-the-scenes like this, come hang out: @aishapreece PPS: Here are some recent pics this week! I got some feedback from August snail mail and I visited some cool spots in Kl with my irish family!
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