Paul says:
When I speak to business owners the thing I am most interested in is why did they go into business in the first place? What was it that made you decide that you no longer wanted to have a job?
For me, one of the main drivers was that I didn’t want to work for someone else. I wanted to be my own boss. But delving a bit deeper, the reason I didn’t want to work for someone else is because I wanted to choose how I spent my time.
So why is it that so many of us choose to spend more time working than playing and end up resenting it? Why do so many people spend time working themselves to the bone, then glance up when the holidays arrive and say: “I can’t take a holiday, I’m too busy”.
For some people (myself included), work can be fun. It’s all about how you look at it.
But no matter how much you love working in or on your business if your fairy godmother appeared to you one day and said:
“Next week you can have your dream holiday, all expenses paid for, with as many friends and family as you want to take……but you have to go next week because after that the dream holiday won’t exist anymore….there will never be another opportunity to live your dream”…
….I believe that you would take the holiday.
So this year I decided to do things differently and spent two of the first three days of the year in a small village called Findhorn on the Moray Firth in Scotland (http://www.forresweb.net/findhornbay.htm). I went with my dear friend Mel Harris from www.thetrainingtree.com and stayed at the only hotel in Findhorn, The Crown and Anchor Inn (http://www.crownandanchorinn.co.uk/), which is right by the bay.
After a bit of a manic year in 2006, I spent the time clearing my mind to enable me to make pro-active decisions for 2007.
It’s been a while since I had taken a complete break from everything and it made me remember why I went into business in the first place. And when I came back the first thing I did was start planning. I thought:
“What does my ideal year look like?”
For me, it is about balance. I enjoy working in my business and buying property, so I want uninterrupted weeks of time to focus on building both my business and my property portfolio.
But it is also about taking regular time out to get refreshed and creative. So I started by putting in my big holidays with the children, the training courses I wanted to attend, the weekends I wanted to see the important people in my life, and then fitting my work orientated goals into the rest of the time. The amazing thing is that despite, in effect, taking the first two weeks out of the business to plan, I have achieved so much more than I would’ve done normally by this time of year and I have a realistic view of what I can achieve in the rest of the year.
Bring it on!
For another great article on planning check out Andy Shaw’s article in this month’s Passive Investments newsletter.
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