Being in business is a bad way to run a business.
I came to that observation today when reading a trade magazine. What happened is that a few weeks ago my wife and I decided we didn’t really want to continue with the business – it was taking up too much time and effort.
So we closed a section down and kept the easy bit going. If that gets too much we can shut that down too.
So today I was reading this trade magazine – just enjoying reading it because I didn’t have to be thinking about what we could be doing to stay ahead of the curve – and there were a couple of good articles in the magazine.
One in particular was from a man who was retiring after 40+ years in the business. He dropped little gems of information that I think I would have missed if I had skimmed the article or simply not read it because I was ‘too busy running the business’.
And that’s it in a nutshell – too much ‘hurry hurry worry worry’ (even when things are going well) leads to no time to absorb and think.
Information overload and the nagging drive to get ahead or stay on top reduce our ability to let our minds absorb information in its own time – in its own correct time.
Worry saps our energy and stresses us at one and the same time. We become hooked on beating the train as it thunders along behind us – threatening to catch up to us and grind us into the dust. It’s easy to see how workaholics thrive on the addiction. They are fixed on the track as surely as the train is.
The answer is not solitude exactly – although that state of mind will help – it is being aware and dealing with the situation as it really is – which brings us back to the fact that being in business is bad for business. Worry and stress are bad for business.
No matter how much it might seem to hurt, someone else has got to take part of the load and deal with part of the worry so that we can slow down and smell the roses and the coffee and ‘learn’ and make wise decisions.
Hire a manager – get someone who can do those things well – and then take time out to relax, to think and think creatively.