Are You Living to Work or Working to Live?

Quotes Heard Around the Water Cooler, Over Business Lunches and the Family Dinner Table…

• “I worked 70 hour last week in my business…”
• “I haven’t taken a real vacation from my business in three years…”
• “I am putting in so many hours in the business now so we can spend time together in retirement…”
• “I am sorry I can’t come to your soccer game this weekend, Alex, I have too much work to do…”

Sound familiar?

Most entrepreneurs and small business owners I have worked with, coached, mentored and masterminded with with can probably recite these lines by heart, since this is what we are TAUGHT is necessary for business success…that you essentially must sacrifice your life – or major elements of it – in exchange for “making it” as an entrepreneur and to achieve the mythical pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

Unfortunately, I think much of what we have been taught misses the mark!

I Know These Quotes by Heart…

I know them because I have said every single on of the lines above at sometime over the past decade.  I bought into the myth that you had to put living on hold while you built your business and that later…after too many late nights to count, too many missed opportunities to connect with my wife, my children and my friends…would I be allowed to enjoy the fruits of my labor.

I used to wear that 70-80 hour workweek like a badge of honor on my arm…but a conversation with a good friend from the UK about 5 years ago drastically shifted my perspective on this.

He made the comment that in the US, everyone seemed to be living to work…never taking vacations, spending endless hours at the office, sacrificing everything for some very uncertain future payoff.  He suggested that we might be better off focusing on working to live…to focus on current connection, on what is truly important in our lives and what is real and tangible NOW.

I think he is spot on!

Over the last 5 years…I have taken great strides to live more consciously, to see my business as a conduit to support the life that I really want to live today, not 20 or 30 years from now, to ask myself if a particular business decision gets me closer to or farther away from that ideal life.

I am still a work in progress…and sometimes take a step or two back…but I have clarity, purpose and intention around where I am going and why.

How About You?

Is your business a vessel designed to support the life that your really want to live TODAY or is everything focused on SOMEDAY?

Take a few minutes and think about 2 or 3 changes you could make in your business right now to start moving into alignment with what you really want…what your heart really desires for you, your family and your broader community.

Here are a some ideas to get you started:

• Hire a VA (Virtual Assistant) to move tasks you really dislike or are not good at off your plate
• Hire a personal assistant and/or housekeeper to free up personal time to do the things you enjoy
• Fire that client that makes your stomach knot up every time you see their number on Caller ID
• Review your products and/or service offerings to see if they are really what you want to be offering
• Only see clients 2-3 days a week and free up the rest of the time for strategic planning, marketing and down time
• Schedule a “Me Day” or “Personal Strategic Retreat” or “Goof Off Day” and just reconnect with yourself
• Hire a professional organizer to get your business and/or personal files (and life) in order
• Raise your rates

Now look at the list and take immediate action on the one that speaks to you the most (and is probably the most scary).  Do it today!

What’s on Your List?

Let me know what’s at the top of YOUR list and how I can help you achieve it…

To Your Success,

Phil

PS – If you are really ready to create the business that supports your ideal life, please join us for a week in Tuscany on the Total Business Transformation Ultimate Tuscany Experience.