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One of the problems of being an entrepreneur or striking out on any endeavor that you have never done before is a big focus on what’s going wrong. I’m not saying you shouldn’t do that, because that’s how you improve. It is important to remember that sometimes too much focus on the negative stuff that happens can be detrimental to your success.
I’ll give you an example. This morning if you’re watching this video, you woke up. This morning, if you’re watching this video, you had something to eat, depending on your dietary habits, or you will have something to eat. You got in your car, it started then you went to school or work or wherever. If you really sit down and think about it, 90% of your life goes right whether it is just living, having fun or enjoying friends and family.
With your business, that is a whole new thing. You started it. You show up every day. You may not be yielding results, because you may be in the wrong business. You may have not planned properly. There seems to be a tendency to focus so much on what’s not going right that you completely ignore the things that are going right.
If you would really look at the things that are going right and amp those up, that’s going to help you get past those sticking points, those blind spots and deficiencies that are going wrong. Make sure you understand me. I’m not saying to ignore the things that are going wrong. That’s crazy.
What I am saying is just as much as you are putting an emphasis on the things that are going wrong, you should also put an emphasis on the things that are going right. Track, monitor and get feedback and take it apart and apply that same expertise and talent to the things that are going wrong.
When you put so much emphasis on things that are not happening in the manner you want, it will suck the life out of you, your business and your relationship. I’ll give you an example of something I did many, many years ago. I was very immature. I was really stupid. I had a job. It was a very good job, back in the the day when you’d work ninety days and they’d give you a dollar raise. That doesn’t exist anymore.
There were some people on the job that were very, very unhappy. They became my friends. Slowly but surely, their unhappiness became my unhappiness. There was like a militant revolt. My friends would say, “I don’t like the way they’re treating us.” I’d say, “You’re right. They’re not doing right by us.”
For some reason, I don’t know what was wrong with me, I quit that job that was paying me better than most jobs. It also had a great work environment but I chose to allow the misery of other people to contaminate me. It happens in a lot of workplaces. One or two negative people can infect the minds of coworkers. That’s what can happen when things are going wrong. You allow that to contaminate your joy. It happens all the time.
About six weeks into my new job I said to myself, I hate it here. What was I thinking. I wasn’t thinking. I wasn’t thinking at all. Fortunately, I wised up and I showed some humility before it was too late. Just to give full disclosure, that was a part-time job, and I picked up another part-time job.
So, I just kind of rearranged my schedule. I said, “Hey I’d like to cut my hours back.” Then, I went back to where I was and I said, “Some things have changed and if you ever need me again..” They said, “Could you start tomorrow?” I got my job back. I was lucky. Many of those purveyors of doom and gloom were gone. I just went in there with a better attitude and I worked really hard and it was a great place to work.
What I’m saying is that it is so easy to be distracted by things that are going wrong that you can completely and utterly obliterate the things that are going right.
Understand that 90% of the time life is good, unless you are a walking catastrophe of a person, and those folks are out there. But if you’re like me and most people, 90% of the time, things go right. So, you need to focus on that to give you a buffer to handle those things when they don’t go right.
It’s kind of like putting fuel in your tank. When you really realize what you have and how good things are, those little things aren’t so bad when you put it in proper perspective. Even the bigger problems aren’t as scary when you keep the right attitude.
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