Among all the many reasons that keep people from my Workshop, the central one is fear. Fear they have no talent. Fear their lousy handwriting will interfere. Fear they've never learned Calligraphy. Fear they cannot learn. Fear they cannot sell their new skill.
Fear. Fear. Fear.
Repetitive though it is, my mantra for a decade and a half has been this: It takes no talent. It takes no pretty handwriting. It takes no 'selling' to market your skill. It takes faith and hard work.
Oh, of course it takes time and money and a huge investment of energy and practice to bring it all together. But nobody has to remind you, "There is no free lunch!" Anything worthwhile takes faith and confidence a solid mental commitment, and hard work. That's it. All that stuff about handwriting and talent and selling are merely mental stumbling blocks.
Often, I consider myself the least talented person in the room. Any room. I was not a great high school or college student. For whatever the reason, nothing ever really turned on the juices in me like the overnight college assignment to hand-letter something. That was my life's defining moment.
I'm not good at any other skill-set, but I focused on learning to hand-write beautiful letters with a high speed tool and that is a rare ability. It is done with a METHOD. It is done with a TECHNIQUE.
I persevered day after day after day and soon found I could do something better than anyone else I knew. A passion became a pathway that I never left. For me it took years to develop what I now do and teach in 3-1/2 days. With the experience of teaching over 300 people who took the leap of faith to do something that had enormous potential to produce pleasure and income, I found shortcuts and more effective ways of learning and teaching.
If you have a need or burning desire to learn a skill that has universal demand, produces amazing income, and is not necessary to 'sell,' then take a deep breath and leap. The net will appear!
-Ken