Living an Owner's Life

This is a somewhat longer post than I normally put up. It’ll take about five to seven minutes to read. Sorry I wasn’t more brief.

In recent months, everything finally clicked into place. After months of frenetically chasing every single way I thought I could be helpful to others, I finally constructed the exact best possible way to serve. It came from thousands of interactions with people. It came from conversations at events I attended. It came from hearing what you were willing to tell me when we were standing somewhere quietly, or in replies to various messages I receive, where you let me into your world.

Get comfy for a moment. Grab a drink. I’m having a chilled fayrouz with some extra cookies (that kind of day). You?

Living an Owner’s Life

First, I should tell you that when I say everything clicked into place, I mean in all areas of my life. I figured out my own challenges. I figured out my personal life. I figured out my spot in the business world. All of it. But it came from putting a very core framework in place that allowed me to deal with all of it from the same mindset. Having a framework that you can apply to all the aspects of your life means you’re not forever having to invent and remember everything it takes to succeed. Once something works, you can repeat it. And that’s the first lesson. :)

=Build a core framework (a basecamp) from which you can launch all your adventures (and face your challenges).=

One of the first details I was able to add to my basecamp was the concept of learning versus training. In my personal definition, “learning is something you do to try and grow” whereas “training is learning and growth in support of a primary mission.” Training is the preferred state. It means you’ve got end goals (though these change over time). It means you’ve got a path, a destination in mind. Learning is more like a Sunday drive.

Further, it’s vital to make training every bit as important as eating and sleeping. Training for your mission is how you’ll accomplish anything as an owner. Without training, you’re just ‘trying.’

=Make training (in all its forms) as important as eating and sleeping.=
Owners are geared for action. They never ask “who’s going to tell me what to do?” They ask, “What needs doing?” and they jump in. It’s an active mindset, not a passive. Owners never attend conferences. They participate. Owners don’t read blogs: they study material that advances their training. Owners never “go to the gym.” They devote time to training. Owners never seek motivation: they remind themselves of their commitments.

=Owners are commitment-driven.=

What I learned about commitment from embracing ownership

I learned that commitment (to yourself or others) is a question of love. You can’t keep a commitment if you lack the love to see it through. Think about it. When you commit to a client that you’ll deliver something at a certain date and time, you must honour that commitment by showing love to yourself (you want to be someone of your word) and you must show love to that person (you said yes which is a relationship).

When you can’t keep a commitment to yourself or someone else, that’s a failing of love more than anything else.

If you say you don’t want to be fat, but you’re eating a fistful of M&Ms while saying that, you’ve not yet committed to love yourself enough to get your body back in shape. It’s as simple as that. You can argue with me, but I’m pretty sure I’ll win.

=The core ingredients of commitment are as follows:

Commitment = Resolution + Discipline + Sacrifice

An owner thrives on this formula. If you resolve to make an extra N300,000 a month, then you have to have the discipline to work on your sales daily. You have to sacrifice the time you’d otherwise spend doing things that don’t honour that commitment. That, right there, is the formula for ownership.

It’s how I got my personal life back in order. It’s how I got my health in order. It’s how I got my business moving forward.

=There’s no such thing as work-life balance.=

Balance is a stupid word a lot of the time. Walking isn’t about balance. It’s a series of controlled falls. Buildings aren’t built on balance. They’re built on a strong foundation. They’re level but don’t require balance. Balance, most of the time, is a circus trick.

Instead, consider work-life alignment. Is this life in alignment with my mission? Is my mission in alignment with my life? Are my commitments in alignment with all of it? The word is alignment. Or congruence. Or whatever else you want to say besides balance.

How I got all my time back

I have much more time than you. We both have 24 hours, but I use mine a heck of a lot better, more often than not. How?

• I work from the core of my mission, which keeps me from wasting time on that which doesn’t serve the mission.

• I work to honour my commitments, which means I’m working harder to say “no” more often to that which doesn’t serve my mission or the community I serve.

• I work from the mindset of service, which means that the more I focus on others and the more I aid in their success, the more success comes back to me in the process. This means I know which business to chase and which to abandon.

All of this gives me time that I can use much better than others, who are still chasing everything, trying to learn instead of train, and who are working for loose naira(s) instead of investing in a community.

The Owner’s Life is the core of my commitments to YOU

Above all, have a Legitimate and useful purpose and devote yourself unreservedly to it because vision without execution is just hallucination.

God bless you!