Self Motivation II: A new way to give yourself a kick in the pants

April 26, 2009 at 5:53 am (Baha'i, Entrepreneur, Mother, Verdanta, business, life balance, livelihood)

You’d think that working for yourself would make you extra motivated to get to work.  Turns out, that’s by  no means a given!

Recently, my business partner (aka, my husband) and I had a discussion wherein we discussed the amount of time I was putting into Verdanta.  Specifically, he was questioning how serious I was.  I assured him that I was VERY serious, but admitted that I was having difficulty prioritizing my time.  Part of the problem was, I still identified myself as a “stay-at-home mom.”  The very term implies lots of leisure time, so how could I say no to friends who wanted to meet me for coffee, or talk on the phone, or have me attend just one short meeting? 

After our little chat, I decided it was time to start thinking of myself, calling myself, and acting like a working woman.  It was a lot harder than I would have thought. 

Then a couple weeks ago, my husband was working on the taxes.  It was the first time he’s had to deal with a small business tax return, so it was extra painful this year.  Afterwards, he mentioned that he wasn’t sure if there was a minimum number of hours you had to put into a business to call it a business.  Just to be sure, he suggested I start keeping a work log. 

I started to write down each day the different activities I worked on, and the amount of time I spend doing them.  Then I calculated a daily as well as a weekly average.  I’ve been keeping the log for a little over two weeks now, and I’m averaging over 30 hours per week!  That’s pretty darn respectable, considering my full time job as Mom still comes first.  It turns out, for a compulsive list maker like myself, if I have a choice between watching TV,  and reading a book about web design, I’m going to choose the activity that I can write down in my log.  There’s no doubt that I put in an extra 10 hours each week just by choosing log-worthy activities over pure leisure. 

This was just what I needed to kick my butt into gear!

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Update on Service vs. Service

April 8, 2009 at 5:23 am (Baha'i, Career, Faith, Service, Verdanta, audiobooks, business, life balance, volunteering)

In a recent blog, I was conflicted because I felt like one area of service in my life was competing with another. It didn’t help when my beloved ABM (Auxiliary Board Member) reminded me that the 4 core activities are THE most important thing we should be working on right now.    

Well, as of today, with the help of my ATC (Area Teaching Committee) Secretary, I’ve offloaded a significant portion of my responsibility.  I will continue to support the core activities through tutoring, teaching, etc…, but I will do it within clearly defined time slots.  (A discipline issue on my part.)

But the biggest update for me is that I’ve finally uncovered the one detail that I missed when I originally wrote this blog entry: if I weren’t working on Verdanta, I would be working somewhere else, and it probably wouldn’t have ANYTHING to do with the Baha’i Faith, nor would it be as flexible or fulfilling as Verdanta.

It’s all going to work out just fine.  I knew it would.  Didn’t you?

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Mystery revealed

September 18, 2008 at 5:45 am (Baha'i, Career, Mystery, audiobooks, life balance)

Well folks, it’s true.  Darrell wins the prize!  He figured out that I’m going to produce audiobooks.  I’m still waiting for someone to guess what kind of audiobooks I’m going to produce, but that can wait.

Now I can FINALLY start talking about what I’m actually doing!

The question is, should I start with the beginning and walk through each step?  Or just catch everyone up on where I am today?

Choices, choices, choices. 

The beginning it is!  I’ve left a trail of breadcrumbs; now I’ll draw you a map. 

It all started… well… hmmm…  I guess you could say it was…  When did it start? It could have been this spring, it could have been last fall, or it could have been back in 1997 when I decided to get a Master’s in something other than engineering. 

It’s funny, when you stand still in the present and look out towards the future, it’s a murky, somewhat scary proposition.  What will I do? Where will I go?  Who will I go with?  Nothing but questions, leading into an enormous labyrinth of possibilities.

But when you stand and look back toward the past, you can see how all the crazy twists and turns that your life took now appear to be laid out in a perfectly straight path leading you inevitably to the exact spot on which you stand.  It makes perfect sense.  For example, if I hadn’t joined Toastmasters, I wouldn’t have developed leadership skills, which helped me build my skills and self-confidence.  WIthout Toastmasters, I never would have met DK, MA or RK, all of whom have helped me plant and nurture this seedling called Verdanta.   Without self-confidence and a network of supportive friends, I never would have thought “Yeah, sure, I can start a business.”  Do you see what I’m getting at?  How do you jump into the middle of a life journey and call it the beginning? 

I’m going to have to give this some thought and get back to you…

Stay tuned!

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Mystery Job: Clues to date

September 9, 2008 at 12:34 am (Baha'i, Bliss, Career, Entrepreneur, Faith, Humanity, Mystery, Prayer, Reading, Religion, Service, audiobooks, business, life balance, spirituality, work as worship)

I thought I would summarize the breadcrumbs (aka “clues”) I have dropped so far, so you could see the trail of where I’ve already been laid out more clearly.  There have been a few hints I’ve dropped without labeling them as such, so we’ll see if you were paying attention!

  1. I’m a Baha’i
  2. I love to learn
  3. I love to read
  4. This new career involves at least one activity that requires “mushin”
  5. It allows me total freedom to set my schedule
  6. It lets me use my unique talents (public speaking, organization, leadership and communication) 
  7. It lets me serve humanity through the Baha’i Faith
  8. Books on CD
  9. It fills a need which I have identified in the world
  10. My mission through Verdanta is to “be always occupied with the mention of Baha’u'llah.”
  11. It involves building a business that aligns with the teachings of the Baha’i Faith
  12. My success depends on persistent, consistent, constant action.
  13. I have used the five steps described in “The Power of Prayer” to get where I am today.

That’s it so far.  I’ll even toss out one more:

  14.  It requires the purchase of quite a bit of equipment that must be installed, configured, and learned.

Has anyone figured it out yet?  Drop me a comment and let me know your guess!

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The new business model – Baha’i style

August 31, 2008 at 6:34 am (Baha'i, Career, Entrepreneur, Faith, Humanity, Mystery, Work, business, life balance, livelihood, work as worship)
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Oh, if only it were that easy!   :-)

In my last blog, I explored the idea of service to the Faith within the structure of a for-profit business.  I tentatively concluded that yes, this was an acceptable thing.  But that’s not the end of it, is it?  Obviously, many traditional ”old world” business practices would be inappropriate in an enterprise that endeavours to spread the word about Baha’u'llah. 

What would be appropriate?  Now that is an interesting puzzle indeed!

I have actually been working on a business plan for Verdanta, and in it I was asked to describe the corporate culture.  What would it be like to work there?  So this isn’t just a pie out of the clear blue sky question.  I really want to know, what makes a Baha’i business different?

Two things spring immediately to mind: the first is operating the business based on the writings of Baha’u'llah and Abdu’l-Baha.  The second is the spiritual consequences of doing it wrong.  I guess the place to start is exploring what they have to say that’s relevant to the situation. 

Well, Baha’u'llah told us that ”Truthfulness is the foundation of all human virtues,” so that’s probably a good place to start.  A Baha’i business must be impeccably honest.  Dealing honestly with suppliers, customers and employees, paying bills on time, and following through on commitments all fall within that maxim.  But so do not fudging numbers, not lying by omission, and not taking questionable “gray area” tax deductions. 

Abdu’l-Baha has said that “With education [the inner reality of man] can achieve all excellence; devoid of education it will stay on, at the lowest point of imperfection,” so constant and continuous education must be built into the structure of a Baha’i business.  Everyone in the organization should be allowed – and encouraged – to learn about new things, to gain new skills, and develop latent talents.  Personally, I can say that starting a business is a completely new thing for me, and I learn so much every day that my head hurts from all the neural pathway construction!

Baha’u'llah has also stated that “Work done in the spirit of service is the highest form of worship.”  I don’t know about anyone else, but if the work I do is equivalent to worship, then I’m going to make darn sure I’m working to the absolute utmost of my ability.  Which means excellence and perfection must be the norm, not only for the members of the organization, but also for all products produced by them. 

And since unity is the central principle of the Baha’i Faith, unity must also be a primary goal within the organization.  Most companies today have no clue what that might look like, let alone harbor any realistic expectations of achieving it.  But if you can’t think it, you can’t achieve it.  Fortunately, “So powerful is the light of unity that it can illumine the whole earth.” And where unity is the expectation, it can be accomplished.   

Of course, backbiting would have no place within a healthy Baha’i business, because “backbiting quencheth the light of the heart, and extinguisheth the life of the soul.” The company culture should be shaped such that everyone knows backbiting is unacceptable. 

I could go on and on, but what I notice in writing this is that a Baha’i business must strive for the same spiritual perfections that individual Baha’is strive for. 

Hmmm.  One last quote comes to mind, and that is ”Bring thyself to account each day, ere thou art summoned to a reckoning.”  It seems that I must not only bring myself to account each day, I must also bring to account the dealings of my business, for they ultimately reflect back on me and my spiritual progress. 

Wow.  How different would the world be today if all our leaders felt that way?

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