It's Not a River in Egypt
I admit it. I've made some mistakes. Oh, sure, I talk about all
of the things that went right and that I did pretty well with my
home-based business, and that's true. But I would be doing both
of us a disservice if I were to leave you with the impression
that all is well in "Home-based Business Land", that I live in a
carefree fairytale world of wealth and consumption, and that my
bills are all paid and will continue to be. No, it's not like
that at all. And it's only just recently that I identified the
problem. It can be summed-up in a single word: denial.
My business is centered around software that is dependent on a
technology that is slowly going away. I had a nice income stream
(customers pay an annual fee), but as my customers drifted to
new technologies my base of income eroded. I could see it
happening. For years I said "This gravy train isn't going to
last forever!" I chose to ignore it. Why? Denial. Although I
wasn't consciously aware of it, I took the attitude, "I'll worry
about it when it happens." Suddenly the revenue is alarmingly
low, and now I have to deal with it. Had I dealt with it sooner,
it would have been much easier to fix.
A friend of mine recently went to New Zealand on a speaking
tour. She agreed to pay her own airfare and the organizer
('Peter') would pay for hotels and for her speaking appearances,
plus she would be able to sell her books and tapes at the
seminars. It was not until after she arrived that Peter informed
her that most of the seminars had been cancelled. After she
arrived! He knew that participation was going to be low. He knew
that they might have to cancel. He didn't tell her, though,
because he was in complete denial.
Denial is what we do when we just can't face the truth. It is
very real, but it does nothing to fix the problem. Did Peter's
denial of the failure of his seminars change anything? Did my
denial of eroding revenue change anything? YES! In both cases it
made a bad situation worse.
Two things happen when you are in denial. First, you have more
anxiety because you haven't examined the situation enough to
know how bad it really is. No matter how bad it is, it's easier
to deal with if you know where you stand. Second, there's a
pretty good chance that delaying the solution will make the
problem worse, maybe even completely unsolvable. By denying the
problem, you may be passing up a golden opportunity to fix it.
Easily.
Do you have a situation that is too scary to deal with? Deal
with it anyway.
Do you have a situation that is too embarrassing to face? Face
it anyway.
Deal with it. Face it. Get it over with. You can't make it
worse; you'll only make it better. You'll feel better too.