The conversation generally starts a little like this, I must have this one at least once a week, often more:
Friend: “Hey Alex, how’s it going?”
Me: “Been pretty busy the last week or so, hectic!”
Friend: “That’s good then…”
Alex: “No not really, I don’t equate busy as good”
Friend: “Oh, but busy means you are doing well doesn’t it?”
And so the explanation begins.
The explanation, that is, of why I do not equate busy with things going well, in fact I would say that largely I see the opposite as being true.
The typical insinuation is that being personally busy relates to making money, or at least creating revenue. However even those two things are somewhat different if you have a good understanding of the basics of business.
Now, any one who has been involved in running a business for any amount of time, will know the frustration felt when your carefully planned day, week or even month is turned upside down by something from out of no where. Maybe it’s a mistake made, an outside event, the failure of a piece of essential equipment or any number of what might even seem like little things when you look back at it, but at the time will require immediate attention and was certainly not on your to do list, probably not ever!
So in my world, busy usually equates with a either a planning failure or something coming out of the woodwork to bite me. I guess if the question I’m asked was is the business busy? Then I might be writing something different here, but it’s not, the question relates to a state of being many people largely feel more comfortable with, in my view, often because it means they are not thinking, they are doing.
In many ways I believe that every business owner would be wise to take the work on in, not in it mantra very seriously. Being busy often will pull your thought processes away from keeping the elevated position you need to see the big picture and plan accordingly.
However there is something I value more than any other thing in life, the quality of my time. It is my opinion that if you were lucky enough to be born in the West somewhere between 1940 and now, no matter how poor or unfortunate your early life may have been, the fact remains you were born into an era of incredible opportunity. Few era’s (possibly none) in history allowed the amount of social mobility ours has. Of course everyone has had a different start in life, but there is no denying, that if you were lucky enough to be born in the West, have courage, vision and will power, then you have every chance of making a successful, financially secure and happy life for yourself and your family. The major question is have you thought about how to achieve this? It’s all possible but the likelihood is that unless you have given it some serious thought then you are leaving your future success to chance.
If you were born in the west and have courage, vision and will power…
Another title for this article could have been good busy, bad busy.
I equate good busy with doing things which I find fulfilling, I equate bad busy with any task that does not have an absolutely clear direction or outcome.
In my time in business one of the single biggest mistakes I’ve made is not having absolutely clear outcomes. As soon as goals & outcomes are fuzzy then there is a very good chance you are going sideways (at best!)
Many people think they have goals but when they are asked directly it soon becomes very clear they don’t. In his excellent book “The Bullet Journal Method” Ryder Carrol brings for a simple concept called intentional living. Basically making almost every action you take in a day intentional not random.
I started using this method around 4 years ago and it was actually a revelation. Now, I’d always planned things out, made notes, set things out ahead and worked towards a goal, but this is another level.
In the four short years of using the method I went from being a moderately successful man to being a very successful man. I achieve every goal I set and set the goals in a way that make a real difference to the way I both live and the way I interact with the world.
Busy is now a dirty world for me, I personally equate busy with disorganised. Whilst everyone will be doing an activity intensely from time to time, your mindset around the tasks will play a major role in how you feel about where it is the energy spent, is taking you. Once you have a hold of this then you will see the world quite differently.
Its good not to be so busy right?
The Anarchist Entrepreneur 