Let the Beauty of What You LOVE Be What You Do

The following post is a sample from my book: The Power of Influence (Chapter 3). You can get it on Amazon.com or for the iPad. 

Passion + Prosperity. It’s so super simple, it really is.

LOVE WHAT YOU DO AND THE MONEY WILL FLOW

It’s that old saying that we’ve all heard and doubt immensely. The questions tend to stir up in our minds that are ultra-fear based. But how will I pay my mortgage? What happens if I get sick? I have kids to feed!  And the list goes on…

Now I’m not advocating that you quit your job and tell your boss where to stick his or her hourly wages. Entrepreneurialism requires extreme planning and diligence too - with a pinch of flying by the seat or your pants from time to time. Remember that this is your life. You only get one shot in this physical experience that you currently occupy. No one knows for sure what happens when the lights finally go out, but I’m pretty sure it’s a good idea to focus on what we can consciously grasp in this life while you’re still here on the planet. Contemplating one’s mortality can sometimes be excellent for getting off your ass and finally doing something. It really puts things into perspective on a grand scale to know that one day you’re going to croak and during your final exit scene all of the important aspects of your life will flood to the foreground. More than likely it will be thoughts of your loved ones and then thoughts of what you loved to do. All I’m saying is that you should make your life memorable and one of these vital elements to live a vibrant and fulfilling life filled with passion.

Think of the stuff that you really love to do. Think about the way it makes your heart sing, your mood improve and everything just seems to fall into place effortlessly.

Picture this…

You’re sitting in an artificially lit office for 40 hours a week shuffling papers in a brick walled cubicle. Your life is governed by working for a period of three hours and then going outside to eat a cucumber sandwich for lunch before returning indoors again to shuffle more papers. Life hums away to the monotony of routine. It runs like clockwork, day in day out – with the extreme comfort of familiarity which is rarely a challenge.

At this point in your life you have just turned sixty. You’ve been working for (let’s say) Lurch & Co. for forty years and you love to make strawberry jam on the weekends. The jam making process lights your soul up like a Christmas tree and you can’t wait for Friday to roll around so you can go home and turn your kitchen into a production line. The week after you retire you turn your little jam making hobby into a market stall and start to make 4 times the wages you made sitting behind a desk! Obviously you kick yourself because you know you’ve wasted so much of your precious time living in fear of the unknown. We see evidence of retirees making a mint from their hobbies when the nine to five days are done and dusted and yet we still doubt if it’s viable.

We want certainty of income above everything else, even if it means compromising our health and happiness.

If you look at anyone that has achieved great success you’ll see that they took a giant leap of faith that eventually paid off. And as entrepreneurs, we live in an extremely fortunate time in history where the Internet offers us a world of possibilities right at our fingertips.  We have the option to implement plans at the simple push of a button. We can connect with people in three (or more) different time zones at once viva the magic of services like Skype. Or we now have the fabulous ability to make money when we’re sleeping if we have the automation process in place to roll in the sales. The easiest way to turn your passion into profits is by loving what you do. Secondly, is to plan and set up proper systems to assist in the smooth structure of your enterprise. And thirdly, you want to understand that business is an evolutionary process that will expand and go through metamorphosis over time.

As an entrepreneur, you’ll know the exquisite feeling of living life on your own terms.

Perhaps you’re dreaming of the day when you can finally say goodbye to your nine to five job and say hello to the life of the self-employed business owner. The feeling of working for yourself is amazing, but at the same time you’ll also understand that every new business idea requires an extremely strong level of commitment. You know that you need to do whatever it takes to breathe life force into your project.  Just like being the parent of a newborn baby, a new business requires strict time requirements and many sleepless nights. You sacrifice your own spare time to invest in the success of your new venture. You do whatever it takes to obtain the freedom that you seek. And it’s all about freedom. So often we think that raising over a million bucks in revenue will change our lives for the better. But when we peel back the layers a little bit we see it is ALL ABOUT THE FREEDOM that the money will bring you and nothing else.

I’ve spent many nights working into the ambrosial hours until my eyeballs sting. I’ve skipped meals, ignored phone calls and sometimes plonked my children in front of the television to buy myself a few extra hours of writing time.  The strangest part of building your own business is that the excitement that you feel doesn’t leave you feeling tired. You feel exhilarated and above all alive because of the wondrous opportunities that you’re working towards. I remember how I’d sit down at my desk to write when my children were in bed at 8pm. I’d type away being totally in the zone of productivity. I’d then look up at the clock and it was 3am! I’d sleep for three hours and then wake up at 6am to work for an hour or so before the children woke up. Passion for building my business is what sustained me. Someone should bottle that stuff up and sell it as vitamins! I’m serious, it’s like this weird driving force takes over and your passion becomes fully harnessed. A word of warning though, you must not work like this to the detriment of your family or your relationships. I’ll be discussing this is more detail in the chapter called ‘Entrepreneurial Lifestyle Design.’

If you’re reading this and you’re thinking that you don’t know what your passion is, please don’t despair.

Discovering your passion is a process that unfolds over time and in all honesty you have to be extremely in touch with yourself. So, if you want to start your own business the first thing you need to do is identify what you love to do. Making sure you’re on the right path is vital to the direction of your future.  So you need to pay close attention to the way you’re feeling. If your passion is shoes for example, then you’ll know it’s your passion by the feeling you have when you think about shoes. You’ll feel your face light up when you talk about them. You’ll feel that little twinkle of excitement in the pit of your stomach. You should feel lighter, uplifted and inspired when you think of anything remotely shoe related.  Please note, however, there’s a huge difference between loving shoes as a consumer and feeling exhilarated by all of the different facets associated with footwear such as design history, materials, shapes and appreciating the journey of designer Manolo Blahnik. Your passion flows from a very deep level as if it’s a gateway to your ultimate freedom.

I think the most accurate piece of information that my mother ever told me was how to identify what you’re passionate about.  She said that if the activity that you’re doing causes you to lose track of time and make the Universe disappear then you’re doing what you love.  That’s exactly how I feel when I’m writing. I feel totally connected to the moment and engrossed in the creative process so much so that time flies by at lightening speed.

There are many issues to consider before plunging to the world of entrepreneurialism. I really believe that identifying your passion is the easy part. The trickier part of the equation is carving out a suitable niche for yourself that allows you to indulge in your passion and turn it into a profitable venture.  This is where the deliciousness of the journey really comes into play.  I know from personal experience that your ideas will morph and grow considerably from your first initial plan.  Recording or journaling the process will be highly amusing to look back on in a few years time. You will clearly be able to see that all actions and decisions allow for expansion into other amazing actions and decisions.

If you’re one of those people that think that happiness is a destination, then today is your wake up call!

I’m going to try and help you tap into the awesomeness of the journey. And something I’ve noticed on my travels is that if you feel happy now, then the journey is a lot quicker and you arrive at your desired destination at an accelerated pace.  I think that the number one element that sabotages the attainment of your goals is seeking happiness as a future experience.

You might want a certain sum of money in your life to give yourself permission to be happy. Or perhaps you want to achieve a certain level of fame or notoriety? Or maybe you’ll be happy when you finally move into your dream house? Or magically manifest your perfect partner? The answer is no. Once you get to the point that you think you should be happy, you find that it’s moved to another ridiculous location.

If you look at time from a linear perspective, then you can see that the past has already happened, the future hasn’t happened yet and the present is all you have to work with.  NOW is the time to feel happy and grateful for your life in this precise moment.  Be present, beam with appreciation and watch the magic of your new attitude move mountains for you and your chosen passion-fuelled pursuits.

What are you passionate about? Are you already making money doing something you love? What is your dream?

Love, love, love

Sarah xo