Where's Your Head At?

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1K followers

I've read two very different blog posts in the last couple of days that both touched on the mental game of being successful here at WA or in basically any entrepreneurial endeavor anywhere. The first was Mel's post I won't tell you what to do in which he briefly hits on the difference between an employee mindset and a business owner mindset. The second was a post by a member that was mentally tearing himself in half between a desire to make large sums of money and a complete loathing of the pursuit of money. (That may sound crazy, but I've been there, although not to his degree.) For me these two posts touch on two sides of the same mindset coin we need to have to be successful here on WA.

The Business Mindset

I've hit briefly in a previous post and on my profile about my sort of life long immersion in studying business and entrepreneurship. Largely because of this and the influence of my father I've never had an employee mindset. Sure I've had jobs where I worked for other people, but as Brian Tracy likes to say, I was always the founder, president, and CEO of Me Inc.

Brian Tracy's philosophy is that even if you don't have your own business, we are all the heads of our own one person company whose job it is to sell our services for the highest return. When I worked for other people, I never looked at them to GIVE me a raise or a promotion. I looked at what they wanted and figured out ways to deliver it at such a high level that the smartest business decision they could make was to raise my pay or promote me to ensure that I was happy and stayed with the company.

When I was 18, a friend of mine that had worked at a couple different companies with me asked why I was always paid more and basically allowed to do whatever I wanted to do. That attitude was the reason why. I tried to explain it to him, but he never really got it. This isn't self congratulatory or a knock on him or anyone else that doesn't get this. I was lucky. I was raised this way, so it's been ingrained into me.

One of the best books, I've ever read about the business mindset was The E-Myth by Michael Gerber. (I think the newest version is The E-Myth Revisited). He talks about the difference between being self employed and being a business owner. A self employed person is not employed by someone else, but still has to show up everyday to work or he doesn't get paid. I'll confess that this is essentially what I am now and what I'm in the process of getting away from.

A business owner on the other hand is someone who develops a system for consistently delivering a product or service to the customer. Once they build the system they can hand off operation of it to other people so that it continues to make money whether they are working or not. To see a superb example of this from a WA member read New Niche Site Project by BeauAndNik. While the process itself is great, focus on the mindset behind how he builds the process.

As Mel points out in his post, in order to be a business owner and not a self employed person, you have to have the mindset of figuring out problems for yourself without relying on other people for the answers. In order to build a system, you need to know how each aspect of that system works. I don't think Mel nor I are saying never ask anyone here on WA for help. Rather try asking not what you should do, but how you can go about figuring out what you should do.

The Value Mindset

The other side of the coin is the value mindset. Here on WA we talk a lot about making money. But if you really understand the concept of money you'll understand that money is just a figment of our collective imaginations. It is the universal placeholder for value. It is the lowest common denominator we all use to represent the tangible things in life we actually consider important.

If you take the time to start asking WA members what they're really after, most of them will tell you that the money is just a means to an end. It's a means to have the freedom to travel, to not work a job they hate, to spend more time with their families, or to devote more time to things they are truly passionate about. When you see the success posts saying I made my first $1,000 dollars or whatever, what they're really saying is I just got this much closer to the things I truly value in my life. They're just saying it with the universal placeholder we all can relate to.

The people here on WA and pretty much anywhere, that are solely focused on the money usually have a very hard time making it. The reason for this is because even if they don't realize it your potential customers see money the same way. It's just a placeholder for them for what they really value. If you're incapable of seeing the things of value that are represented by money, you'll be incapable of giving those things to your potential customers.

As an example, there is a WA member who writes a blog that reviews books. The value she provides is not inherently the reviews themselves. You can go on Amazon now and read all the reviews you want. Part of the value she offers is her curated list of books to read, but even then Amazon offers recommendations on books to read based on the ones you've purchased. The real value she offers her readers is that her reviews are flipping hilarious. Her personality just pours out onto the page. Every time I talk to her I die of laughter, and her reviews are written the exact same way.

Now, I know she doesn't look at it this way. It's just her being her. However, she's never going to feel like she's screwing her customers telling them about a book that they should buy because that's not really what she's doing. She's giving her readers an entertaining experience and finding a way to make money at it. There's a big difference between the two.

You need Both

You need both of these mindsets to truly be successful. You need to be able to figure out what you're customers value and give it to them in a genuine way, and you need to build a system around that which consistently produces that result whether you're there are not. How you do this will depend greatly on your personality, your niche, your business model, and so many other things. Figuring this out is part of what being a business person is all about. The training and community here at WA can go a long way toward getting you there, but cultivating this mindset is ultimately up to you.

So with that I ask... Where's your head at? --> https://youtu.be/Br1fuTY1-Zg



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Recent Comments

32

Good Work!

Thanks John!

Excellent post!

I define money just a little different than a placeholder for value. I define it as a measure of value. We exchange money for services and products. Collectively, this is supply and demand. The supply is the solution/answer to our demands (wants/needs). The greater a product meets our needs, the more value we place on it. Or the more difficult it is for us to find a solution, the more value we place on the solution.

Thanks Glen.

I wasn't really going for a definition. I don't really know what my definition of money would be. The reason I specifically decided to not to call it a measure of value though was because there are some things I listed in there that I wouldn't want to define in terms of money, like time spent with your family. From a purely economist view point I realize that technically that's what we do every time we go to work instead of staying home with our family, but I didn't want to draw that emotional comparison.

Maybe the way I worded it was really a difference without any distinction. I don't know. But from a purely business stand point I agree with you for the most part. I agree with supply and demand obviously. But as a marketer, I also intimately understand the amount of "artificial" value for lack of a better word that is created purely by perception. But that's a whole other conversation. :)

I've had successes and failures doing my own thing, but it's always more exhilarating than working for somebody else in a job.

Same here Rick. It hasn't always been rainbows and unicorns, but even the hard times made me come out better for it on the other side because I had more invested in it when it was my creation on the line.

I've had mines either, but ... that's been my hilarious and a so much exciting period lol so that's the reason I am back to work for myself. BUT with the goal to build the business on an autopilot ... Cheers Cosmicradio and Numerous, Jeff

Thanks Cory, it really is how you think and see yourself.

Very true. Before you can build anything in the "real" world, you have to be able to build it in your mind first.

A brilliant post that got me thinking! Thank you very much:)
Cat

Thanks. I'm always happy when I can get the gears rolling :)

A great inspirational post indeed, thanks for sharing it :)

Thanks Tosh. Glad you liked it.

I enjoy learning from what you post, especially being from a non-employee-minded upbringing; it truly is a gift you have to not have the other mindset. I try to instill the business-owner mentality, however which way I know, into my kids' mindset as much as I can (although I'm outnumbered by the other traditional-minded family influences). Since I can't really put them in a bubble, the audio books or mp3s in the car serve as the "bubble."

My hope is in working to take positive actions toward building the business; this way of life will eventually prove to be better than what they're hearing otherwise from the others.

Like I've mentioned in other posts, my dad had me listening to tapes starting at the age of seven or eight and they definitely had an effect, so good on you for that. Your example, will also have a big effect.

The other thing that played a big role, was my dad had me working in his cleaning business at the age of 12. There were many times when I hated it, but it did teach me a lot about work and earning my own money.

For reasons that aren't really relevant, he didn't do this with my sister. Don't get me wrong, she's a lawyer so she's not exactly slumming it, but there is definitely a wide gap between our views on life. I don't know how old your kids are, but when they reach the right age you might try both having them help you with what you're doing and helping them set up their own sites.

Thanks for sharing your experiences.

My son just turned 8 and the girl is in the fun 2's. I think there's still time to get her trained entrepreneurially since she's already so tech savvy. Time is on her side to soak in the info.

He says he wants to have his website, except for sitting through the training videos and reading long enough to learn it (doing the work). He just started streaming with Hubby and loved his airtime. Maybe that could be his niche, and this conversation may have sparked an experimental case study as we'll get his "winter enrichment project" going?

We'll we all find our own niche in terms of how we want to build a business as well as what the business is about. At 8 years old I think he has sometime to figure out what works for him yet. :)

It's awesome that you're getting involved so young. They are very lucky kids.

Thanks Cory for your post. Great truths.

Thanks

Great post, Cory. This is very much a mind game and so the importance of the right mindset cannot be ignored.

Thanks Steven. I appreciate the positive feedback :)

Thanks Cory. This is a great post!

Thanks

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