For years now I’ve accepted the fact that I’m a scanner and have given myself permission to work on all kinds of projects.  Any kind of Blog idea I had, I would just launch it.  Any kind of affiliate marketing campaign I could think of I would try it out.  If I got inspired to learn about any random subject like advanced nutrition or energy healing or psychic development I would just dive into it.

I love being a scanner and the variety it brings to life and I would never change that about myself. However lately I’ve been realizing something that I think is very important for scanners to learn.

What I’ve realized is that after I learned about the scanner personality type a few years ago and finally gave myself conscious permission to do whatever I wanted to do, I kind of went all over the place doing everything.  It was like a burst of freedom, similar to when I first got my drivers license and my first car.

Finally having the freedom to do whatever you want to do without feeling a shred of guilt about it is a liberating feeling that I hope every scanner personality accepts in their lives.  However, I’ve come to realize lately that by going in so many directions at once I’ve been hurting my progress due to energy being spread in too many directions.

Instead of creating projects that give me a variety of things to pursue in a concentrated effort, I was pursuing a variety of projects with a single direction each.

Think of it like being in the military and instead of choosing the role of a “special ops” type person who is trained in all different kinds of skill-sets, it would be like trying to play the role of a sniper, an explosives expert, a communications officer and five other more specialized roles at the same time.

When I used to play World of Warcraft I made the same mistake.  The first character I created was a Rogue which is a very specialized class of character.  Then I got bored of it so I started another class which was a Warlock, which is a little bit more versatile but is still a specialized class.  Then I started a Mage (another specialized class) and a Warrior (another specialized class).  Without realizing it I was actually looking for a more versatile utility class that can do a little bit of everything (World of Warcraft version of a polymath/scanner) which would have been the Druid class, but a good friend of mine already had a Druid so I didn’t want to pick the same class as him.

It wasn’t until the expansion pack came out for the game where the Shaman class became available that I started a Shaman.  The Shaman is a utility class just like the Druid and since I started that character it’s been a lot more fun for me to play it, because I can do a little bit of everything (dealing damage, healing, spells, etc.)

The merger of this Blog is another example of the same thing.  Instead of starting this type of “utility” Blog that allows me to explore many areas of who I am in one place, I went out and created multiple specialized niche Blogs and sent my energy into multiple directions.

Now that I’ve merged my blogs, it’s crazy how much easier it is to get value from my efforts.  Looking at my RSS count alone inspires me so much.  Previously I had multiple Blogs and each one of them was “semi-successful” but it was always hard to build an audience.  The first 100 RSS subscribers is always the hardest for any Blog.  Now, combining all my “little” blogs into one I’ve brought my RSS count above the 5,000 mark.  In reality, it’s more about 6,000 but some of the subscribers aren’t being shown in the Feedburner badge even though they are receiving the RSS feed.

However, +5,000 is still way more exciting than having a few Blogs at the 2,000 range and a few at the 10 – 100 range.  It’s also going to make it easier for me to rank higher in any kind of lists or ranking systems, probably easier to attract advertisers, as well as easier to rank in the search engines etc.

So, my question to all the scanners out there is this – Have you found a project or direction for your efforts that naturally combines your varied interests into something you can apply your energy to in one direction?  Are you embracing projects that naturally lend themselves to the scanner personality, or are you putting your energy into projects that are best suited to the specialist personality and trying to do five or ten such projects in an effort to have the variety that you desire?

You may find it a lot easier and a lot more rewarding to focus your efforts on less projects that naturally offer more variety per project, than more projects that lend themselves better to the specialist personality.

The last week since launching this Blog I’ve realized just how much more time and energy I now have that I’ve combined my efforts into one direction.  I didn’t realize just how much “overhead” running multiple Blogs involved.  I should have combined a long time ago.

It’s given me the time and energy to start looking into another project I’m thinking of starting that will also align in the same direction as this Blog.  The alignment of my energies in one direction may just be the biggest change in my entrepreneurial journey since leaving the corporate world on January 1st of last year.