This is my “just back from vacation” article. You remember vacations, right? The place you go to relax and forget about “real life,” the place you go to re-think and clear your head. That place. My place this year was Edisto Island, S.C. pictured here by my friend John Sinclair and taken from the deck of the house a bunch of friends shared for a week. Just look at that moonlit horizon. You remember horizons, right? The imaginary line that recedes as you approach it. Happiness is like that for some people. Are you one of them? Do you think of happiness as being out there for you “someday, maybe, as soon as…? Just like those horizons?
Now before you get offended and write me a snippy little email, consider the words of a man who lived 2,000 years ago. “To what can I compare this generation? They are like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling out to others: ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge and you did not mourn…‘” Evidently people two thousand years ago – just like people today – believed moods were the result of circumstances and environment. But unless you suffer from a chemical imbalance, I believe your mood is the result of where you’ve chosen to focus your attention.
While I didn’t really want to come back to work, from vacation (sorry clients- like you but didn’t really miss you), it made me able to re-think what I’m doing and how I do it. Here is my thought:
Happiness is a product of focus.
Focus comes from having a purpose.
Having a purpose comes from being needed.
Being needed comes from serving others.
There you have it. No matter how you slice it, happiness comes from serving others. The needs of others are what help you stay focused in the midst of swirling troubles. They keep you centered in the eye of life’s storm and give those struggles meaning because it suddenly matters whether or not you’re here.
Now, here comes the business tie-in to this article (drum roll, please).
If you’re saying to yourself, “I’m not needed,” because you haven’t made a sale recently, landed a client lately, gotten a promotion at work or worse yet, have lost your job; might I suggest that you’re needed and needed desperately by people— people you’ve not yet met! Why not go out and find them? You’ll recognize them. You’ll recognize them because they aren’t using what you can sell them to make their jobs or lives so much easier, you’ll recognize them because they are the one’s who don’t know about your services and how excellently you deliver them, you’ll recognize them by the fact that they are doing things the hard way when you have a much simpler or more cost effective way of accomplishing the same task. I recognize potential clients by their lack of creativity in seeing the forest for the trees, their inability to make connections to other markets or industries because they lack that expansive experience or by the fact that I will often address an issue they are having and I can see the why didn’t I think of that “lightbulb” go off.
I have chosen to focus on new business development for my business while leading my current clients to their successful and desired outcomes. That makes me happy; not vacation happy, but work happy.
Can you identify who needs you and focus on serving them? It will surely make those horizons a whole lot brighter.
Do you need more help in your business? No matter what obstacles your business faces, you can be sure of one thing—others have faced them before. And overcome them. Let’s talk about your business, your goals and your ambitions. And then let’s talk about building that marketing roadmap to get you past whatever is holding you back.
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Tags: advertising, advertising failures, brand loyalty, Branding, business barriers, business gains, call to action, Catapult Effect, change your business, changing your life, creative ideas, creative marketing strategy, Creativity, marketing, Social Media