Most athletes, like most entrepreneurs, will never earn worldwide fame while taking one team to the top. The majority of entrepreneurs will bounce from team to team, but that doesn’t stop any of us from reaching for the hall of fame.
Athletes have to train, prepare, and even eat with the end goal in mind – to win. Although each meeting and sale is important for our business, it’s the work that’s done behind the scenes that makes it all possible.
Each day you fail to move forward or practice your craft, you’re in essence taking a step back, and moving further away from your goals. This is where focus can be your most valuable co-founder, and it’s what separates most talented athletes from many talented and creative entrepreneurs.
Professional athletes know that hard work and focus is the way to accomplish their goals. They hire others to worry about contracts, trades, and even what team they’ll end up playing for.
Entrepreneurs have to map out their path and have millions of different team choices and new ventures and ideas trying to occupy the space in their mind. There isn’t a clear path for an entrepreneur, making the journey even tougher.
Over the past few years, I’ve allowed days, weeks, and even months to go by without making any forward movement on my business. I spent time trying to start multiple websites and startups while going to school and working several part time jobs.
Can you imagine a professional football player leaving in the middle of a season to play hockey and basketball, and then trying to come back at the end of the football season? There’s very few that can do this, just as there are few Elon Musk’s and Richard Branson’s.
The further I went without taking an action step on a business, the harder it was to just jump right back into it. It’s not that I had lost interest or passion in what I was trying to accomplish, but I did lose focus, and I wasn’t giving my business the attention it needed.
Commit to Taking a Step Everyday
“Practice puts brains in your muscles.” - Sam Snead
Even an athlete with the potential to be the greatest in the world can’t achieve their goals without regularly practicing and focusing in on their goals. It’s a different kind of practice, but working on your business, whether the creative side, planning, accounting, logo design, or any other aspect of the business, is all part of the process.
After merging my two passions of entrepreneurship and writing, I knew to make a difference and truly dedicate myself to be the best at what I do, I needed to commit. Really commit.
Late last year, I decided I would publish every day of 2015. It hasn’t been easy, but doing anything significant isn’t supposed to be. It’s a constant practice. A journey that at times is so tough you may want to quit. But if your goal lies at the end of the journey and you have what it takes to make it through the tough path, it’s worth the mileage to get there.
What can you do starting today, tomorrow, for the rest of the year? What step are you going to take today to focus on your dreams and forget about the distractions?