There are no linear paths to true success. Everyone who has ever made it in a big way has travelled a journey more like a rollercoaster or a game of snakes and ladders.
Doing the same things every day for years probably won’t grow your business to new heights. But what will? Finding the ladders. Avoiding the snakes. Assessing your actions to cut out what’s holding you back and do more of what will propel you forward.
There are five everyday actions most of us do because we think they are productive. But they are not. Here’s why they are keeping your business small and here’s what to do instead.
1. Chores, errands and admin
Doing things far beneath our potential is keeping us playing far beneath our potential. If you saw a job advert for a taxi driver, cleaner or admin assistant, but you’re aspiring to be a multimillionaire, you wouldn’t apply for the role. Yet you’re effectively doing that when you run errands, tidy up, do your washing and wade through your tax return. As soon as you’re making more than $20 an hour it makes zero sense to do things you could outsource for less than $15 an hour.
If someone else can do it, don’t do it. Instead, spend the time resting and recharging or simply take on more clients or do things that will grow your business. There are no awards for the tidiest house, someone else could do your washing just as good as you, and your insistence on keeping hold of the little tasks is preventing you tackling the big ones. Outsourcing is the way.
2. Working all the time
Working non-stop in between your alarm clock going off and you being too tired to move might be costing your business success. Without resting, you’re never fully recharged to do your thing. Without switching off throughout the day, even if only for a few hours, your default mode network can’t kick in to sort through challenges for you.
Your mind needs rest and distraction for epiphanies and breakthroughs. Without intentionally switching off throughout the day, you’re always in beta brain waves, sorting through tasks without seeing the bigger picture. You’re ploughing away all day, head down and so into the trees you can’t see the wood. You’ll miss the opportunities that could help you leapfrog because there’s just no space.
