Four Powerful Lessons for Creating the Small Business—and Life—You Really Want!

A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending a terrific conference in San Diego put on by Lisa Sasevich of The Invisible Close. While she shared a lot of powerful information specific to building my type of business, and to making sales without being salesy, the tips that really hit home were a bit more general. However they still packed a powerful punch.

All of these I already knew to some extent, but something Lisa said, or a part of my own experiences in the last few weeks, has really crystallized these ideas for me.

So today I want to share four of the most powerful ones with you…

1)    Just do it!

Most things are better done than perfect.  Really. Here’s why… Money likes action. And taking massive action—even though it might be imperfect—is critical to growing a successful small business. I’ve seen this work in my own business as well as other people’s more than once. And you can’t take action if you’re always waiting for something to be just perfect.

Lisa took it one step further with an analogy that made so much sense I just had to share it with you…

“It’s impossible to correct your course if you’re standing still.”

Much like a ship, there’s no way to change course if you haven’t even left the dock. In other words, you need to take some kind of action now. And don’t worry so much about whether or not it’s the be-all-end-all thing that’s going to get you where you want to go.

Just get your ship out of port. Then if later you decide you’re not headed in the quite the right direction you can always make a change. But you’d never know that if you didn’t start the journey.

2) You have to invest in yourself, or no one is going to invest with you.

Sure, you can get a lot of terrific info at no charge on the Internet. This weekly e-newsletter is a prime example. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

But at some point you need to step up to the plate and make a serious investment in yourself and your business…Whether that means buying a product, taking a teleclass, attending a seminar or conference, hiring a consultant or coach, or something else.

If you find lots of your prospects just want to pick your brain for free, this could be your own freebie mindset coming back to haunt you. Plus, I know from my own experience that every time I’ve bit the bullet and invested in myself I’ve made that money back almost immediately—even when it seemed like something I couldn’t afford at the time.

Now you can’t just start spending money willy-nilly, or buying all kinds of products and not taking action, and expect to have it come back to you. But if it’s something you clearly can’t afford NOT to do, then find a way to do it.

3) Decide and commit.

Again on the subject of action…Don’t spend forever debating whether or not to do, buy or try something new. Make a decision. Then commit and either do it with gusto, or don’t.
The thing you don’t want to do is sit on the fence waffling and wavering. That just adds more to your mental plate and doesn’t get you anywhere.

I learned this lesson in my first year of kayaking. We were standing on the river scouting what was to me a big, scary rapid. I wasn’t sure whether to run it or walk around it. So I just stood there staring at the whitewater rushing by as all the saliva dried up in mouth and I developed an abnormally urgent need for a bathroom break.

My friend, seeing I was stuck in analysis paralysis mode, shared these sage words of advice, “It doesn’t matter whether you walk the rapid or run it. The key is to make a decision then commit to and go.” Turns out these words of advice are just as useful in life and business as they are on the river.

4) Set specific goals.

This is one I’ve long known and preached (and it’s how I’ve built my business and bought all my real estate), but Lisa shared a perfect example of why this is so important…

You’ve probably heard people talk about things like the Law of Attraction, or how you  tend to get more of whatever you’re focused on. Bearing that in mind, it makes perfect sense that if you’re not focused on anything in particular you probably won’t get it.

As Lisa put it, you wouldn’t call a clothing company’s catalog sales department and say, “Send me a couple shirts and a pair of pants.” Because who knows what you’d get. Instead you’d know the exact sizes and colors of every item you wanted when you picked up the phone.

That’s what you need to do in your business and your life. Only then can you make decisions and take advantage of opportunities that will lead you closer to your goals. So if you don’t have a detailed vision of what you want your business—and life—to look like 1, 2 and even 10 years down the road there’s no time like the present to figure that out and write it down.

Do have other lessons for creating the small business you really want? Please share by leaving a comment below…