3 questions that infallibly predict if you’re going to fail (again) at learning copywriting
Learning to write copy that sells is not uncommonly difficult. It takes only relatively little time — if you learn in a way that leverages your existing conversational skills.
The problem is, nearly no copywriting training does this.
If you’re trying to learn copywriting, you’ve probably gone through at least a book or two...if not an entire training course already.
Yet here you are, reading about how to learn to write copy — again.
Since you’re here, let me ask you...
Do you find yourself focusing on the long-term goal of “creating a funnel” or “learning to write copy” — but never deciding on short-term, concrete steps to achieve this?
When you set time aside to work on this goal, do you end up “thinking” about it but doing very little?
Do you compulsively browse the web looking for more information, because you feel like there’s at least “one more thing” you must learn?
If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, then you should know this:
These are all symptoms of your brain’s survival circuitry going into lockdown mode.
When this happens, you cannot progress on the task before you.
People like Seth Godin call this brain circuitry your “lizard brain.” It’s the “ancient” part of yer noggin that handles basic emotion and decision-making — and especially the fight-or-flight response.
I think evolution is hilarious religious nonsense, but the image of the lizard is apt.
Mr. Lizard is really a sophisticated filter to help us make quick decisions without getting overloaded — or killed. Exercising dominion over a wild world requires good heuristics.
But in the modern world, sometimes these heuristics get confused.
For example, if you take on an intimidating task — like creating a sales funnel and writing copy for it — Mr. Lizard tries to help by treating it as dangerous. To protect your survival, he goes into flight or freeze mode. All your subconscious machinery is devoted to stopping or running away from the project.
The more you think or read about it, the more overwhelmed you feel...and the more firmly Mr. Lizard goes into flight or freeze mode. He never wants to attack that problem.
And when your subconscious mind never intends to let you actually achieve your goal, you probably never will — no matter how hard you consciously try.
This is your lizard brain:
This is your lizard brain learning copywriting & marketing:
Right now, I’d put money on your lizard brain being in “flight” or “freeze” mode.
You don’t tend to notice this, because, well, it’s subconscious innit. But the symptoms I asked about are a dead giveaway.
Unfortunately, even when you know what’s going on, Mr. Lizard often cannot be overcome by willpower alone. You have to change your approach.
If you stick with how you’re currently doing this, in a few weeks’ time you’ll be no better off than you are right now. I’ll place money on it. You will realistically be no closer to having working copy implemented and generating income.
You might feel closer. But you won’t be.
But if you change your approach, in a few weeks you can have working copy generating income. I guarantee it. That’s what Copywriting Night School is for.
Btw, there’s a good reason your lizard brain has such trouble with learning to write copy: most copywriting training sets you up to fail in lesson 1. More on that in the next post...