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Time To Pay The Piper
By Jeffery Wood | November 11, 2009
As I recall, the story of the Pied Piper goes something like this:
A town was overrun by rats so a visiting Piper promised to get rid of the rats if they paid him. They agreed and so by piping on his pipe, the rats, enchanted by the music, followed him out of town.
When he tried to collect, the town refused. So the Pied Piper went through town playing his pipe and all the entranced children followed him out of town.
I forget what happens next. Those old stories often did not have a happy ending because their purpose was to teach a lesson, whether a moral lesson, or a warning or whatever and not to entertain children.
In any case, the phrase “Time To Pay The Piper” is because of that story.
What does this have to do with anything? Plenty. In a guest post I wrote called Work Smarter Not Harder:Work when you work best I wrote about how it’s important to find when during the day you are at your best.
For example, I work my best in the early morning…I mean early morning, like 4 or 5, whereas the rest of my day is better spent on things like e-mails, Twitter, etc.
Well, this morning it was time for me to pay the Piper. I had several Squidoo lenses I was supposed to have had up and running last week (well okay, before last week)…and didn’t. Granted I was really sick for two days and kinda didn’t work too hard on the third day just to make sure I was recovered, but the fact is…a week later and they still weren’t done.
That’s not the only place I’m behind in, but that’s all I’m gonna fess up to.
So on a day like today, where I should have been able to kick back, sleep in, and work only if I felt like it………I got up at 3:45 am and “hit the books”.
Three hours later I actually got all my lenses done when I thought I’d only get two of them done. I had a blog post mostly written yesterday, but I thought I’d delay it because I think this is slightly more important.
Here’s the point of this: If you want to succeed in your online business, whether you work on it full time or part time, regardless of your personal definition of “success”, you have to pay your dues.
If you play now and pay later, like I did with the Squidoo lenses, the interest grows and the tax man cometh.
Did I absolutely have to get up at 4 to make it work? Yes. Technically I could have spent today doing it, but I am at my peak working early morning and I needed to be focused and productive and it would have taken me 2 to 3 times as long if I put it off until later in the day when I’m not at my best.
Being online doesn’t mean you don’t have to work. It means you get to choose when and where you work. If you can afford to outsource, then you also get to choose what you work on.
But make no mistake about it, you will work.
If I didn’t take my internet marketing business seriously, then it really would not have mattered if I got those done or not. Will they work? I don’t know, that’s not the point. The point is that I do take my business seriously and that means committing myself to getting it done.
I don’t care if you only have 15 minutes one day out of seven to work on your business. If you are serious about your business you will work hard during those 15 minutes.
I don’t care if you only have $2.00 to set aside every three months for your business. If you are serious about your business then you will do everything you can to make sure you are spending that $2.00 as wisely as you can.
Forget the lucrative lifestyles you’ve heard about. Put aside the dreams that you’ve gotten from the truly successful online people like Rosalind Gardner at netprofitstoday.com or Lynn Terry at clicknewz.com (don’t put THEM aside, put the thoughts of the lifestyle aside).
I better clarify. Those are two people I trust when it comes to information. So listen to what they say, not to the lifestyle they have (which is a good lifestyle to have). Until you are there, you need to not concern yourself with dreams.
Don’t your dreams inspire you? Forget it. Make your dream a goal instead, roll up your shirt sleeves and start paying your dues. You either pay now and play later (which is the dream) or you play now and…..well, that depends on if you ever get serious and down to business or not.
- Jeffery
P.S. It’s your business, treat it accordingly.
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About Jeffery: Jeffery Wood, author of "Learn How To Set Up Your Own WordPress Blog And Forum" is a Part-Time Internet Marketer. |
Related posts:
- Jeffery Gets Serious
- Time Management Implementation – Intro
- Time Management Implementation – Part Four
- Internet Marketing Myth
- Time Management Implementation – Part Three
Topics: Blog Marketing, Productivity, affiliate marketing, business, time management | No Comments »