What To Do When You Find Out You Are Not Original

"I get knocked down, but I get up again. You're never going to keep me down." That's right, my friends. That tune has been in my head all week long. Let me tell you what happened. I mentioned before I have been working on this project for over a year and a half. I'm sorry, I don't want to tell you about it quite yet, but I will soon, I promise. All you need to know is that it's something that I've been working on for quite a while. It is something that is very near and dear to my heart. It has changed me in so many ways and I can't wait to share it with everyone. The process is really long and as you can imagine, being a busy mama or a busy parent or busy anybody, it is really hard to find time for things that don't just fit into your regular day.

Because this project was so important to me, I was finding time to make the time and carve out this time. It is something that really means a lot to me and I think it's going to mean a lot to a lot of other people. Well, I'm finally getting sort of closer to the end of this project and I decided to start looking around and see what could be similar out there if I'm thinking of putting a cost to it, or maybe it's something I give for free. I start doing my research and what do I find? But low and behold, my exact same idea already exists. Almost even the same name is already out there in the world. And it was created four years ago. And I know what you're going to say. You're going to say, Courtney, if you had this project that was so important to you and so near and dear to your heart and you cared so much about it "How come you didn't do this research sooner?"

I didn't because the idea came to me so organically and it just popped in my head. I started to try it out on myself, and I really liked how things worked, and I really thought it was something incredible. I still do. I believe this is something incredible that I could share with so many people and it's going to make a big difference for a lot of people.

But here it was already sitting on the Internet. My idea. So that's why today is sharing with you my top five tips if you find yourself being not so original. So before I even give you my tips, this is important. Before I even decided what the next step was, I had to really feel the feels. I say this because I find sometimes that we are all in such a rush to bypass feelings and push them away and figure out the solution? I felt disappointed. Then I put on that tune and I was ready to get back up again.

TIP 1: ACCEPT IT

All right, that's not to be harsh or simple, but it needs to be done. If you think about it, I mean, really, everything has been done before. One of my mentors, Marie Forleo, has this great podcast, The MarieTV Show, that she always talks about what if Lady Gaga never became a singer because there's too many singers out there, or Oprah never became a television talk show host because there's too many of those out there. My idea is what if you went into it not only just accepting the fact that everything has been done before, but if I had gone into it, expecting it. Then the surprise wouldn't have came right? I would have known. Yeah, my idea is really awesome, but I'm sure someone's already done it before. To be honest, if I went into the whole project thinking someone's done this, I think I would have even planned it out differently and I would have done a lot of things differently. That is my tip number one, go into something like this.

Number one, expecting that someone might have already done it before. And if they have done it before, then accept it. Because now you can move on to step two.

Tip 2: Know the reason why you created what you did

What does it mean specifically to you? People can call it your reason, your why, your purpose. It will not only give you the passion you need when things are getting tough, but it can set you apart as well, I think about the company, Toms. I love their shoes. They're super cute. I just bought a pair recently that had little golden bees on them, and I almost bought like three more pairs. They were just so darn cute, I just had to have them. But I also buy them because what they stand for, they know their purpose. They know their reason. They know where their why is. And when you look at their shoes in comparison to someone else's, it might give you that little nudge to be like, hey, yeah, I want to buy those ones instead. So it's really important to know what you're doing and why you're really doing it. Sometimes if you realize the reason isn't for the best reasons, then it might be time to move on from that project and find a brand new one.

Tip 3: Figure out the differences and amplify them.

This is the time you want to do your research and take a lot of time to do it. There is no way that whatever you've created and what's already out there is the exact same. Go through it and don't ignore the fact that this thing exists. Check it out. Take the time, and whatever those differences are, make them even bigger and greater than if you can even connect them to that reason or your purpose or your why now, everything will be building on top of each other.