Wednesday, April 24, 2013

From the Best Place - The Heart

I call them: The Negative Nellies as I'm sure many of us do. These are the people who never seem to have anything nice or supportive to say. As an entrepreneur, I and many others come across these types everyday, and have for as long as we can remember.

I've spent many years surprised to find that these folks were people who I considered "required" to support anything I imagined. Many years, as in: I'm 30 and I'm just figuring it out. Better late than never, right?

So what am I talking about by "required?" I'm not necessarily talking about those awesome financial handouts (but I'm also not not-saying that... if that's your boat). I mean the people you  expect will go along with whatever you say just because they're your mom, or your dad, or a sibling, a best-friend - you get the point.

These people have notoriously been the very people that say or do the worst things in regards to your intentions. For some, this is just the right push. These people take on a prove-'em-wrong approach. Some succeed, and some fail. Some won't even try at all. Personally, I've done both; tried and failed, and failed to try at all. At those times the decision never really mattered.

Of course, as it is our human nature - especially as we near our 30s - we reflect and maybe even regret. We tell ourselves we can't change the past, and to learn from our mistakes.

In all my failures and reflections I have focused on the lessons - and trust me when I say there's been many, but that's another story and we're talking about support... or lack thereof... On this topic, I have the mother of all lessons, and its this: dismiss their methods and appreciate where it comes from... their love for you.

What? I know, right!

The people who love you the most tend to fear you being hurt by failure. Some people will go to great lengths to prevent you from facing a bad experience. The point is that it comes from their heart; and that they love you enough to stand in your way of "taking a bullet" shows they mean well and will always be there whether you succeed or fail. Count on them for what you know they will do and appreciate the knowledge that it comes from the best place - the heart.

...Of course, sometimes you just have  a real jerk on your hands that just needs to be showed what's up. Haha, I'm just kidding. Among the many lessons I've learned, take time to laugh has always topped the list. ^.~

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

So You Want To Work From Home

It seems like everyone you talk to these days is an entrepreneur of sorts and they aspire to work from home. To each their own, and for whatever their reasoning - that's great. However you want to roll, right? After talking to so many people who are trying or doing this, I can tell you from both experience and listening that you need to be sure that's the route you want to take.

Why?

Well, simply - if it's not for you, you will go nuts.

So let's put things into perspective by first figuring out why this is the route you want to take. Been out of work for a while? Tired of "dealing" with the stresses of working for someone else? Want more time with the family? You have a great money-making idea? Pretty popular thought processes, aren't they! Well, you are the folks who should probably stick to your day job.

Nothing can seem more tempting than jumping on the next big multilevel marketing thing that pops up; especially when you're down and out about having sent out hundreds of tailor-fitted resumes and either haven't gotten nibbled, or you've been through so many interviews and still haven't gotten that final call back. How about the men and women just trying to find that happy balance between work and home life? Daunting, and yet look at how many people make working from home work, right? Stop and think, though. There is not a career in the world that will pay you to do nothing. You will have to do something in order to make money. It's just that simple. Too many people are sold on this idea that they can buy into some marketing and networking business and it will just magically start accumulating money. It doesn't happen unless you make it happen.

"So what, Sabrina - I'm ambitious and I have a plan." Great! Don't let me squash it, but understand - your plan is nothing until implemented. Does that sound mean or as straight forward as I can put it? I will be the first to tell you how many "plans" I've got that will make life awesome and as glamorous as I imagined. You know what? Not a single one of them will be anything more than a note in my pages without the right resources. Money aside - resources include your time and effort. If you are unwilling to get out there, meet people, and invest in your plan it's just not going to move off that paper on its own.

In the meantime, you're probably beginning to realize how much you really don't want to spend so much time around your family or your home. Sure there's plenty that you could do in a day - like work in the yard, repair a leaky sink, change the oil on your car, play some board games, heck - even homeschool your kids and take them to the park more frequently. That's great for the person who enjoys those things, but if you're not motivated to make your at-home business work, then all that other stuff just becomes stuff you could be doing when you stopped doing everything and anything at all. See what happened there?

"Thanks for busting my bubble, Sabrina." You're welcome. But like any rant I go on, please let me help you with the solution. It's simple. Fill your day and schedule what you've filled your day with. Like a million people before me will tell you - put times to your plans. If you want to play with your kids - awesome - but put it on the schedule for a set time. If you want to create a business, sweet! But, put aside the appropriate time for accomplishing everything you need to in order to get it off the ground. Most importantly, make time for you. My "me-time" is a 30 minute run on my treadmill everyday, and whatever fitness I can fit in between doing everything else on my schedule - like this blog post (but you should totally see me knock out my squats while cooking dinner). Granted, I didn't know the topic until I sat down and wrote it, but I gave myself the time to write something on my blog. Glad am I to say it turned out to be something more than a "hey y'all."

Remember this simple guiding light, though: sacrifice. Your time is not yours alone. It belongs also to those you live with, those you service, and those you haven't even met yet. Now, that doesn't mean you can make everyone else happy, but you can pick and choose what battles you take. Maybe that means you have to wake up earlier, or go to bed later (or not at all). The point is - you have to create the balance. It's not going to happen just because you want it to. Make every minute of your day (and hopefully not all of it, but some part of the night) count for something. And because measuring your success (and hopefully not the lack thereof) is crucial, use a checklist. At the end of everyday look at your list and see what you've accomplished. That will help keep you motivated and satisfied to do just about anything.

That's all the time I have for this today. ^.~ Live productive and awesome lives, y'all and stop holding yourself back.