I was recently in a discussion on the business of software forums where a user was asking for advice on how to complete the project he had set out for himself. He was having trouble finding time to focus on his product with the demands of daily life. His predicament reminded me of a story I once heard which motivated me to focus on work, and shows how time blocking can work as a strategy to achieve your goals.
A woman with a family of four was working as a consultant, and wanted to bring her career to the next level, but wasn’t sure how. After doing some research, she thought that the best way to advance her consulting business was to literally write the book in her specialized topic, then use that as a sales driver with customers. Her biggest obstacle was finding the time – Her daily work typically kept her busy from 8 in the morning until 6 at night. Her two young children needed time and care in the afternoon, and she wanted to spend time with her husband. Looking over her schedule, she decided that the best time to write the book would be after the rest of the family had gone to bed for the night, but she was still energetic enough to work. She blocked off 2 hours every day, from 10PM until midnight, to write. This allowed her to commit to 4 hours with her family and to maintain her normal work schedule. She set a goal of completing the book in one year, and set about writing it. At the end of the year, she had a fully formed and polished book, and was shopping it around to publishers. She used this inspirational story of the book creation process in her pitch to publishers and the marketing of the book (which, coincidentally, is how I heard about it). One year after deciding to write a book, she had a book published in her niche, and was using that to improve her business and drive sales.
This story was reprinted in another post, where additional success stories were discussed, including the story of Jessica Watson, a girl who sailed around the world solo at age 16, blogging about it and later publishing a book, as well as Rudy Ruettiger and his heroic effort to join his college athletic team.
The point behind all these stories is that people had a dream which many others stated was impossible, impractical, or foolish, yet each of them overcame numerous personal obstacles to achieve their goals. Many people talk about the reasons why they can’t start a business or achieve their dreams, but perhaps they have just not been willing to figure out a system which works for them, and will put them on the path to achieving their dreams.
I was once talking with a friend of mine about a business idea I had. He asked a simple yet hard question. “What did you do today to make it a reality?” I didn’t have a good answer – it was only an idea I’d been having for a couple of weeks. If you have a dream, what did you do today to make it a reality? What could you do tomorrow?
