Samantha Bennett - Start Right Where You Are: How Little Changes Can Make a Big Difference ...

More Praise for Start Right Where You Are

Sam Bennett masterfully blends the practical, spiritual, and personal in this easy-to-read, FUN-to-do approach. No matter whats up for you, you can find a way to begin and, if necessary, to begin again. These short chapters are so funny and warm. Its the perfect book for the stressed-out person er...everyone.

Linda Sivertsen, bestselling author of Lives Charmed and
host of the Beautiful Writers podcast

Praise for Sam Bennetts Get It Done

Like Steven Pressfield...Sam Bennett hears you, knows you, is you. She has been in your shoes, felt your fear, and been as stuck as you have. In an astonishing act of generosity, shes shared all that in this magnificent book.

Seth Godin, author of The Icarus Deception

Sam Bennett is refreshing in her positivity and achieves something rare a how-to book that is funny and entertaining to read, and makes you feel good! Now, if youll excuse me, I must go write an Oscar-winning screenplay. Or clean my room. One of the two Ill figure it out.

Rachel Dratch, actor, Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock

According to Sam Bennett, we dont need to be literally airborne in order to create: we can soar in only fifteen minutes a day. Her easy-to-do approach made me feel absolutely invincible....So have fun, dont ever let anyone tell you that you cant do it, and keep Sam around as your capable guide.

from the foreword by Keegan-Michael Key,
cocreator of Key & Peele, writer, actor, and producer

Recommended for people who continually feel stymied in their pursuits.

Library Journal

If you need help getting things done (and who doesnt?) this book, written with love and passion, will help you.

Ed ONeill, actor, Modern Family and Married with Children

Calling all artists! Are procrastination and perfectionism getting in the way of your sharing your creative gifts with the world? Through small, doable steps, Get It Done will help you make your big ideas real.

Jennifer Lee, author of The Right-Brain Business Plan

Sam Bennett is a genius really.... Get It Done is the book you will come back to time and time again for inspiration, profound truths, humor, and one-of-a-kind practical tools.

Amy Ahlers, author of Big Fat Lies Women Tell Themselves

In these pages, artists and nonartists alike will find brilliant, tangible tools to tap into their inner organizing genius. Even when it feels impossible, we all can create bits of time, and Bennetts strategies put fifteen minutes a day to superb use.

Marney K. Makridakis, author of Creating Time

Fantastic for creative types of all stripes (actors, songwriters, visual artists, musicians, screenwriters), amateur, preprofessional, or professional. What Sam Bennett has to share is invaluable.

Phil Swann, singer-songwriter, producer, author, and teacher

Sam Bennett is the kind of insightful, articulate thinker who can make sense of the roadblocks we all face each day. Her book will help you get unstuck and on track, so that you can accomplish your goals.

Clate Mask, cofounder and CEO, Infusionsoft

Ive been meaning to read Sam Bennetts book for a while, but I havent done it yet. Im sure it is very good.

Charlie Hartsock, executive producer, Crazy Stupid Love
and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone

Also by Sam Bennett

365 Reasons to Write

By the Way, You Look Really Great Today: Selected Poems

Get It Done: From Procrastination to Creative Genius in 15 Minutes a Day

Less Crazy, More Money: 52 Secrets to Running a Serene, Profitable Business

Copyright 2016 by Samantha Bennett

All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, or other without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

Text design by Tona Pearce Myers

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

First printing, November 2016

ISBN 978-1-60868-443-4

Ebook ISBN 978-1-60868-444-1

Printed in Canada on 100% postconsumer-waste recycled paper

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Luke
and a world of new beginnings

Contents

I WANT TO RAISE A GLASS and say that I am so impressed with you right now.

I am impressed that you have committed your time, your intellect, and your emotional availability to this this project of you. This project of you moving through your life in a way that feels better, calmer, kinder, more like the real you, less reactive, less self-sacrificing, more self-nourishing, and with more laughter.

Before we begin, I want you to see an email exchange I had with a potential client recently when he wrote to me about an online workshop I was offering:

Hi Sam,

While I applaud your efforts and wholeheartedly agree with your philosophy, the bottom line is that you are a motivational speaker and people feed off of your energy because that is something that they cannot provide for themselves. Its not about the book or the event, its about your personality and charisma....The problem is, once the book is read and the event attended we are usually back to square one.

Anyway, I wish you success in your efforts and I will continue to watch your webinars, you are really quite therapeutic but unless you are going to move in with me and give me a kick in the pants 24/7, this stuff usually doesnt work.

B.

Heres what I wrote back:

Hi B.

I think that what you are saying is exactly true but only for about 80 percent of my audience.

That 80 percent attend a training or they read a book, they get excited... and then they go right back to their same old patterns and nothing changes.

As near as I can tell, that 80 percent number is true for all personal development stuff, from gym memberships to preachers to diet plans to financial strategies to everything else on the planet. Shoot most of us wear only 20 percent of our wardrobe most of the time; the other 80 percent goes unworn.

And I think thats fine.

If 80 percent of my audience are going to use me as a source of temporary inspiration and entertainment, well, then whats wrong with that?

The remaining 20 percent, though... they actually do it.

They take the strategies and ideas I teach, and they run with them, and they change.

They double their income.

They get out of destructive relationships.

They publish their book.

They get their dream business up and running.