This morning after I dropped my oldest daughter off at school I decided to take a jog. It was around 8 am and every morning I listen to a wake-up to success call. It’s a 15 minute call and different people are invited to this call as guests. The topics vary but the guests are always very inspiring, successful people. My wife and I have been guests on this call several times and absolutely have a blast with it.

So I took my phone with me, dialed into the call straight up at 8am and started listening to the call. It was a great call and before I knew it, I was already done with my jog. It was much easier than usual this time and I ran even further than before. Two days before, I felt like I was going to die right there in the middle of my run. It was a ton easier today. Why?

In the military, we would run all the time. For me, 5 to 6 miles every other day is murder, at least it was at first. The military has this all figured out. They use cadence to distract you while you run. While you are concentrating on the beat and the words of the cadence, you all of the sudden find 5 or 6 miles an easy task. It is all about the distraction. It takes your mind off the distance you are having to run and directs it to something simple.

Now, if it’s that easy to take your mind off of a simple thing like running long distances, can we apply that to our lives and how? It is through visualizing!

How and Why do we Visualize?

For me, visualizing is done several different ways and at different times throughout the day. But I always take a few minutes, every day, sitting there in silence, just thinking about my future. What do I want? How do I want it to happen and what is it going to feel like when it does? That is what I visualize and I get so clear on what I want that it feels so real at times.

Visualizing is the very simple technique of taking your mind off of the here and now, the struggles of life, by thinking of what you want your life to be like. It’s a lot more powerful than you may think. Some people may call it daydreaming, but it is so much more. Day dreaming is something that your mind does when you have nothing else to do or are bored. Visualizing takes effort. You are creating an ideal situation and placing yourself right smack in the middle of it. That’s takes effort. It is productive where daydreaming is just burning time. It is an escape, a self mastermind, getting  clear on your purpose, a way to know exactly what your future can hold for you.

Your subconscious mind has no idea what is real and what isn’t. Simply visualizing your goals consistently will cause your subconscious to start to believe it is really happening. When that happens, your actions will start to move you in that direction. Visualizing creates a dream atmosphere for your mind and we all know that if your mind can dream it up, it can happen, and will happen the more you want it.

So my advice is to take time every single day to visualize about what you want in life. It makes the  journey a ton easier, it helps you to become clear on what you want and takes your mind off of anything that may deter you. It really does work!

In the words of one of my all time favorites, “If you can dream it, you can do it.” -Walt Disney

Everyone starts a home based business for their own reasons. For some it’s for the nice home, the fancy cars, the gadgets and the nice clothes. For others it’s for the time freedom. Some people may just want to start a home business to do something different than what they are currently doing or just to get away from their job. Every single individual has their own reason. This reason, is unique, and powerful and is the fuel behind their success. It is the reason they will either fail or succeed. If their desire to obtain this “reason” is strong enough, they will succeed.

The purpose of this post is not to educate you all on the will to succeed. It’s to discuss the importance of having a reason, and knowing when you have obtained your reason.

To give you a quick example, our reason for starting a home based business initially was to make money. At least we thought that was the main reason. We had a mortgage staring at us in the face, bills that were piling up and a shortage of income to make all our ends meet. But once the money started coming in, we found out our true reason. We could have gotten a second job to make ends meet, but we were looking for so much more. We were looking for the lifestyle, the lifestyle that would allow us to spend more time together.

So many parents rarely see their children due to their work. They are not the primary influence in the lives of their children. After missing eight months out of the first year of my oldest daughters life, we made a decision to change. We weren’t about to see our children grow up without us.

Now that I look at my life, I have everything I set out to get by starting my home business. Amy and I were sitting on the back porch, reflecting on some of our goals and thinking of the life we have created for ourselves. The youngest was down for a nap, and Amy brought up our main reason for getting started with this business opportunity. It was to bring Daddy home, to make the income to support our lifestyle and to use that income to travel the world and enjoy each other. We have obtained all that we came here for. Anything we do beyond that is extra and adds to our main reason.

Four years ago when we made the decision to get started, to leave the job and to create our new future, we really had no idea how sweet it would really be. Now that we are living it, it really is that sweet.

Living your reason, your ideal life, is not a difficult thing to do. It just involves making a big choice….and then following through with passionate consistent action. And trust me, it’s a lot closer than you think…..and has always been within your grasp!

Sometimes, working from home can be a struggle. What? Did I just say that working from home can be a struggle? I must be out of my mind right? I mean, you don’t have to get up early, go to a job, take orders, work for a wage, deal with corporate politics, worry about employees, leave the house and miss out on your children growing up. There are a ton of perks and very few negatives about working from home. It has been a huge blessing to my family and I. We love it.

Let me share an example with you of something that can kill your work day progress. Her name is Macy. She is just over one year old, she loves her Dad and I love her, but she cries when she can’t have Dad. Also, I have Kyla and Saydee who are seven and five who also require Dad’s attention. Saydee is not in school yet and is a bored hyper little girl. She can only color, play Wii, play barbies, jump on the trampoline or ride her bike alone for so long before it isn’t fun anymore and she is back to being bored. Kyla gets home from school mid afternoon and is excited to be home and is ready to go do stuff. All of this is why I work from home, I love it. But, if I let it distract my work day, it can be very damaging to my success.

Now, for me, I have to designate a period of separation from my kids in order to be effective. I can’t be holding Macy and type on the computer at the same time. Some people may be able to pull this off. My wife is actually a very talented one hand typer and is probably faster one handed than I am with two. I just can’t do it.

So what we do, is we have an office. A room where I can escape from the kids for a few hours to work. We have established some rules around this office time so that the kids know that I am working and not to interrupt. We made it fun for the girls and helped them make a sign for my door. They know that when the sign is up, Dad is working. It’s kind of funny, I get reminded at least twice a day what the sign means when it is turned one way or the other. They take ownership in the rules. Now, does this work 100% of the time? No! But is sure does help.

I usually work from 2pm to 5 pm every day, Monday through Thursday. Fridays I work in the morning for about an hour. That’s it! The important thing is that my wife and children know when I start work and when I finish work. I have my DMO (Daily Method of Operation) established. There is no frustration of not getting that chance to get some work done because it is planned into my day. I don’t ever get to the end of my day thinking of all the things I have to get done because I never had the opportunity to do it that day. Three hours of focused, uninterrupted work is better than 8 hours of unfocused mediocre work.

If you are a single parent with children at home, plan to work around your lifestyle, not settling for excuses of why you can’t do it. Plan to do it. Work during nap time, before they wake up, after they go to sleep or while they are away at school. Make it a priority and it will happen. It just has to be planned in.

There are some days where all I require is my phone and people to talk to. Those days we are most likely out on the road living the lifestyle. Other days, I am marketing to find those people to talk to. Give and get!

Honestly, there is no comparison to the lifestyle I enjoy. No other business opportunity on the planet can even hold a candle to this. I love my life and have complete control over my time, whether with children or without. They are definetely not distractions, they are not a burden, they just love their Dad. Every time I go into my office, I go there because of them. I am always home while most Dads hardly ever are, and I will never take that for granted.

What other methods have you found effective in managing your home life while working from home. Your feedback is appreciated!

If you are a person who absolutely loves that summer time, what do you find yourself doing most of the winter? Well, I think that really depends on the kind of person you are. You could do two things. You could be negative, complain all the time, never do anything outside, whine about how cold it is or you could think about how nice it will be when summer finally arrives. One way is a complete struggle while the other inspires and motivates you keeping you looking forward to the time when you are the happiest and to a certain degree, makes you forget about the misery of winter.

This post is one of a series of ten analyzing ants, their success in the colony and their work ethic and comparing it to ours. Compared to an ant, we are all lazy slobs, but I think there are a few things we can learn from them and use in our ever day grind.

In the winter time, especially in cold, wet areas, ants are no where to be found. They hide away in their colonies to wait out the cold season. Now I have no idea if ants have the capacity to dream, or visualize, but often wonder what they are up to during this time. Are they making improvements to their underground colony, do they continue to work, do they die, only having a short life span? I have no idea and frankly, I don’t study bugs and don’t ever want to become that interested.

What I do know, if I were cooped up underground knowing that there was a huge world up above just waiting for me, I wouldn’t be very content with being cooped up. I would constantly be thinking of the time that I could again go outside, about the warm weather and about all that I could be doing and will be doing shortly.

You see, someone who constantly dwells on their current misery, will remain miserable, unproductive and uninspired. If the current circumstance is the only thing that person can see, he or she is lost. They are truly stuck underground. All they can see is what is right in front of them. They only see their own misery. But the person who can look forward to a better time, while obviously not in that better time, will always be happier and more inspired. They will have a purpose.

In business, there are winter times and summer times. For most businesses, the summers are considered to be the most prosperous and the winter is the dead season. If you are currently in the winter time of your business, always think of when it will be summer. Make plans for what you will be doing in the summer, who you will be with, what life will be like and how profitable of a time that will be. As you do so, you will increase your energy and excitement for where you are headed and will no longer dwell on where you are. You will have something to look forward to. Make sense?

So, always think of summer while it is winter! Winter will only be as long as you allow it to be.

Have you ever sat there just wondering what might have happened if you would have done one thing or another different? Have you ever asked yourself the question, “What if?” What if I would have gone out for football when I was a senior? What if I hadn’t injured my knees my junior year in basketball? What if I had started that business I was thinking about starting a while back? The questions could go on and on and if you are a normal person, you have asked yourself similar questions throughout your life.

Now, in a sense, these questions can also be considered as mild regrets. It’s not that your life would have been completely different with some of the choices you wonder about, but with others, your life would be on a completely different track. So are all choices important? Absolutely they are, and it kills me to see people who are so undecided when faced with a choice to act. Indecision is still a decision not to act. If a person never acts, they become victims to the term, “Whatever happens, happens!” They are not in control of where they end up.

Now for me, I love being in control. In fact, I spend time every day to visualize my life in the near and distant future. I know exactly where I am going to end up. I devote time to knowing where I will be. Then I choose to act on the things that will move me closer to where I already know I am going to be. It’s simple really and just a matter of knowing.

This question can also be used in direct correlation to fear. What if I fail at this new business, what if I make the wrong decision, what if everybody hates the way I sing, what if nobody likes the subjects I blog about. I read a quote yesterday from Dr. Seuss that read, “Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”

My goal is to have the lowest amount of, “What if’s” in my life. If you think about the path you have traveled in your life up to this point, how would it be different if you had made some different decisions? What if you would have married that other girl, what if you had gone out for sports, what if you had chosen a different major, or what if you had started that business when you had wanted to? Your life would be on a different path, a worse path or may even a better path.

Here’s my advice, make your decisions, and make them quickly. Success is all about momentum. Don’t waste away your precious time thinking about things. That will only kill your momentum and thinking will not get you anywhere. Acting on those thoughts is the secret.

Be decided, always. You are either on one side of the fence or the other. There is no middle. Indecision is a decision not to act, thus staying on your current path of being tossed to a fro by the wind of life. Decisions are the rudders on your ship. Use them to chart your course to your predetermined, premeditated destination. Don’t be the one sitting around months or even years from now asking yourself the question, “What if!”

I have to tell you this story. This just shows you how accustomed our children are to different lifestyles and customs. It’s amazing to see how many phrases that you and I may always hear but when it comes to our children, they are clueless. All they really know is what their parents experience from a day to day basis.

To get straight to it, last night we had invited some guests over for dinner. Well, they called canceled on us. Well, they happen to have a 5 year old girl, as do we, and being a little bummed out, my daughter asked why they couldn’t come over. Amy, of course told her that her friends Dad got stuck at work. After telling her, there was a period of silence and you could tell that she was mulling over something in her mind. She then looked at Amy, and with a puzzled look on her face asked, “Mom, What’s stuck at work?” We both looked at her in shock that she had no idea what that meant. She had never heard that phrase before. The last time I had a job was when she was a year old. I have been a home based business entrepreneur for most of her life. To her, being stuck at work might have sounded a little scary, kind of like being stuck in a tree or stuck in the mud or in prison. Who knows?!

I am proud to say that my kids will never have to become familiar with that phrase. I am never and will never be “Stuck at work!” I am a work from home Dad. I owe it all to the business opportunity I have been involved with over the past four years. It’s given me my life back, and given my children their Dad back!