Stuck in Your Business? Don’t Follow Your Gut.

“Every initiative we don’t take, every risk we avoid makes us more insulated from business opportunities.”

When sales take a dip, deals fall through, or things become stagnant our first instinct is to stop doing anything until things turn around. We hold off on advertising or moving forward on that brochure, or on the website upgrade we desperately need. We’re afraid to invest more because we don’t know how we’re going to make the payments we already have. All we focus on is the void in the pipeline and the surmounting bills and/or debt. This is one of those times not to follow your human instinct to cower in your corner and nurse your wounds. Why? Because fear begets fear and it paralyzes us into inaction. We start looking at normal business activities as risks instead of investments. Even worse, we stop taking those risks which got us the level of success we’ve already achieved!

Every initiative we don’t take, every risk we avoid makes us more insulated from business opportunities. We meet fewer people and will have fewer leads. So what’s the remedy? Action. Any action. It’s really that simple, action begets action. If you take a step out in faith and place that ad, you will find a lead comes through another source you never even considered. It’s as if the universe just wants to see how much effort you’re really willing to put in. Not seeing much action in your business lately? What have you done to generate business? People don’t find your website without being driven to it, the phone doesn’t ring unless you’ve been out prospecting.

I had a professor once tell me “do something every single day to move your craft forward [whatever your particular talent] even on the weekends, because your competitors won’t be working that hard.” There’s a lot of wisdom in those words.

Thomas Jefferson famously said, “I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.” So, how hard do you work? When was the last time you went knocking on doors? Picked up the phone to cold call? How many events do you attend where your target demographic socializes? How many leads have you given others – yes, that’s right. . . how hard have you worked for other people?

Fear tells us to withhold and withdraw and that is the exact opposite of what fosters life and opportunity. It is action that brings forth growth. Whenever fear and doubt creep in, you need to take the opposite action of your gut instinct. When you start doing that consistently, you’ll find that turn-around you’ve been hoping for. So every time you’re tempted to do nothing, to retreat, to give in, or give up – do not follow your gut. Stay the course. Take action. Take more action. Take even MORE action and you will see your pipeline fill, leads coming out of seemingly nowhere and you’ll wonder why you ever doubted yourself in the first place.