Committing to the process requires understanding that the greatest education comes from the richest experiences. In fact, success without process will leave you unqualified to reign over what you’ve built. It is the process that builds your stamina, your insight, and most importantly your relationships, which are the lifeblood of any business.” <- Another cracking couple of lines from business KING T.D Jakes.
So it’s now been nearly a good 6 months since posting the last blog and I can safely say since then we have transcended from being zeros and have entered the land of somewhat significance! As well as perhaps now beginning to have something to contribute to the Norwich creative business world. Of course we are still a baby business, but I am absolutely sure of one thing, which is that we have learnt some of the most important lessons right from the start of our journey.
The best thing we’ve learnt and had to train our brains into is to recognise that the prize isn’t necessarily the end goals, but it’s actually the everyday refinement. It’s a great feeling completing a job, making a new client partnership or receiving that payment. But really the prize is the ladders we have to climb, the growth we make in those day-to-day decisions and the character development. When people just get something handed to them on a plate, they miss out and don’t receive the valuable gift that is failing, picking yourself up again, re-evaluating, re-strategising, then succeeding at that thing only because you’ve become a stronger and wiser person through that process.
Who you become in that daily grind is crucial to the success of navigating a business start up. I get such a buzz when I see how much Jake and Heather have grown in this year. It honestly makes me so happy to see our strength and development as a team. It’s a long and hard process but the character development is absolutely wicked and makes this journey fulfilling and worthwhile.
It’s so important to not only recognise the prize is the process, but to train yourself to love the process. That can be hard too. It takes a lot of work to be at peace with all of the ordinary, mundane days and aspects of running a company. Especially with all three of us being creatives, it’s often tricky to enjoy the many unimaginative tasks that need to be accomplished during the working days. I feel like my best advice to get through these stages is a large requirement of gratitude. It’s important to always look forward, but never wish your life away always looking for the next level or kick. Make the most of the circumstances, remember that these things take a lot of time, and be so incredibly grateful every single day. A wise man told me to always be grateful in the grind. Every day living is a gift, so let’s never waste it.
Setting up a company certainly is a huge life-altering event, and we are well and truly living / breathing the whole Indigo thing now to another degree. If you want to start up something like this, you really have to buckle in and prepare for the never-ending obstacles and life lessons. BUT the difference now is that we see any of these as positives rather than negatives. Obstacles just prepare you for a greater thing on the other side, and as it says above, they are just training grounds to qualify you to be a better director. It’s a great way to build up mental strength, because taking punches early on really does give you a tough skin and equips you to deal with situations better.
Okay so now I’m just going to wrap this up for those who may have came here for a general update rather than a motivational pep talk haha! Mostly what we’ve been up to is: lots of client work (yay!)… we moved into a slightly bigger office in the ideas factory and kidnapped our wonderful friend and amazing freelance videographer, Kinmen Yung, to come share the office with us… We have expanded ourselves from just a motion graphics studio more into a video marketing agency and are now open to video projects rather than just animation projects… oh and we gave a couple of presentations to NUA animation 1st and 3rd years (see picture below)
And perhaps to give you a little insight into hopefully what’s to come next for Indigo, I asked the guys ‘hey what are your visions for Indigo Illusions maybe in the next 6 months or so?’ Of course the first response is more client partnerships as well as being able to make more content aimed for our wonderful followers and viewers… but on top of that, Heather would like to bring some stop motion into the mix, Jake’s been working on a youtube series for advice on creative business start up, and Kin and Jake have some big plans for video documentaries. We are also hoping to transform a corner of our small office room into a mini coffee shop…(so if you have a work enquiry or would like to just pop in for a visit…you may be in for a treat!)
Anyway, thanks once again for reading! Wishing you all the best.
- Lucy
