If running a business was easy everyone would be doing it.
I’ve lost count of the amount of times I've said this to myself. As a business owner there will be times where you want to give up. Times when you think you cannot possibly go on. Times when you feel utterly defeated. However the thing that separates business success from business failure is the ability to keep going.
Look at James Dyson for example. If you haven’t heard of James Dyson he invented the Dyson Vacuum Cleaner. He went through hundreds of versions of the Dual Cyclone system before he was successful. There are probably many others inventors that had similar ideas. But the history books will remember him because he simply never gave up.
The reason I am blogging about this now is that recently I have felt like giving up. I have felt like quitting before but I have never been as close as I have this past month. Over the last few weeks it felt like everything in my life both professionally and personally had fallen apart. Literally overnight things changed and not for the better; and the part that really got to me was that it was totally out of my control. There was nothing I could do to fix these problems. They were just happening and continued to happen.
Have you ever had bad news and then more and more bad news just kept coming? Almost like the universe was saving all the bad news up for you so that it could dump it on you in one day. This is how my life went, everyday I would come into the office and there would be another problem to deal with.
In this midst of all this turmoil I called two of my closest friends - Brad Burton and Croz Crossley. I am fortunate enough to be friends with two men who have ‘been there and done that’. Between them there is nothing they don’t know about mindset and overcoming hurdles in your life.
Croz said something to me when I called him. He said “the worst day of your life has a habit of becoming the best day of your life, you just need to give it time”. When he said this I remember thinking that he was crazy. How could the situation I was in ever become the best day of my life, it’s impossible.
It’s now been two months and I want to tell you something very important. Croz was absolutely correct. Now don’t get me wrong, the problems that started piling up two months haven’t gone away. However I have got these problems under control and I am dealing with them.
More importantly however, doors have been opened which up until a couple of months ago were firmly shut. I am seeing opportunities which never would have presented themselves previously. These opportunities are only appearing as a result of what transpired two months ago.
The thing I want to you to take from this blog is that when you are running a business you will have good days and bad days. Some days will be very good and other days will be very bad. Sometimes you will have days that make you want to quit, they will make you want to give in.
Through personal experience I can tell you that these bad days won’t last forever. Half the things that make you want to quit will be a distant memory in a years time. So if you aren’t going to remember it in a year why stress about it now. It really is true that the worst day of your life has a habit of becoming the best day of your life.
Remember the difference between business success and business failure is never giving up. So go out there, meet all challenges head on, never give up and make sure that you achieve your dreams. Because if you don’t someone else will!
Thanks for reading.
