I have to admit that I am not a fan of the phrase "be realistic". It's not that I want to live in some fantasy world and not know the truth of matters. It's just that I think too many people like to squash people's dreams by telling them to be realistic. Dreams that with a bit of hard work...some persistence..ok...a lot of persistence, some self-belief and some tenacity could actually be achieved. It does us good to have big bold 'unrealistic' dreams, and they should be encouraged.
But that being acknowledged there is something that I think it pays to be a bit realistic on - and that is the effort it takes to earn an income from a home business. There are so many phrases used on the internet about some work from home jobs/businesses - Get Rich Quick schemes, Set and Forget, Money for Nothing, Earn Millions while you Sleep, Massive Returns for Little Work - these are often the unrealistic expectations people can have about online or work at home businesses - that you can earn loads of money on the internet without having to do very much. The odds of that happening are likely to be much like the odds of you winning the lotto - currently around 2.5 million to 1.
Wake up and smell the coffee people!....you cannot expect to start a home business, set up a website and then expect to be an instant overnight success without a little bit of effort. Ask any successful business person - even the ones who seem to have come out of nowhere and created massive results 'overnight' - they will all tell you about the hard work they put in to get there - like the duck's feet paddling under water when everything seems calm above the water.
There are so many home-based businesses on offer these days - really good businesses that allow the average person with a dream to break out of the traditional job and really create the kind of income they have only ever dreamed about. Having these kinds of dreams are helpful, if not necessary to launch you out of what is considered 'normal' and to take a risk. Dreaming about or visualising your income goals - keeping focused on what you are working to achieve is important.
But this is where we need to wake up for a minute and ask ourselves what are our expectations about the amount of work it takes to achieve our goal - the money, the effort and the time? How much do we want this goal...and are we willing to do whatever it takes to achieve it?
There is a huge difference between having a big income goal, and expecting to reach it without working for it.
A business requires some effort - you get out of it what you put into it. If you put in a normal work day at a job you get you set paycheck at the end of the week. If you work really really hard at the same job, if you are lucky you might get a thank-you, but you'll still get that same paycheck. The potential with a home business is so much greater. If you don't work hard you will get little or no returns. If you put in a massive effort the potential is outstanding...and this is being done by ordinary people - no different than you or I every single day. What is their secret to success? Consistent effort - small disciplines practiced every single day. Nothing too amazing - just simple little things done each day - things that are easy to do...but also very easy not to do.
I personally love the industry I am in. I am proud of my home based business and love to see others succeed - either in our team, or in whatever business they are in. But I am sad to see so many give up on their dreams so quickly, after just a week or a month because they had an expectation that they would achieve success quickly and without too much effort.
It might just be the time to bring back some old fashioned values - work ethic, tenacity, discipline, goal-setting and achieving and my favourite - persistence!
