Are You Acting Like a Child When Running Your Business?

Our kids can teach us a thing or two about life.

As I type this, we are on a family road trip from Texas to South Carolina. We left Houston before sunrise. When the sun started to come up, it had to fight a cloudy sky and rain. Our plan was to drive for 8 hours to Alabama and stop for the night. Three hours into our drive the rain still had not let up. I couldn’t help but think it would ruin our time at our beach destination. Then I reminded myself that we still had 5 hours to drive and that the rain in my current location didn’t necessarily mean that it would be raining at my destination.

Have you ever predetermined your future because of your current situation? Have you ever lost hope because you couldn’t see beyond the dark clouds you were currently living in? Having a vision for the future takes practice and discipline. It is easy to fall in the trap of negative, hopeless thinking in today’s self-absorbed, bitter world. You may have a solid plan of action to reach your goals but obstacles can have you question your ability to achieve your goals.

Sometimes we need to take a page from our children’s behaviors and implement them in our business as it pertains to taking action and feeling fear.

1. Childlike Courage: Invoking your childlike perspective and courage can be one of the best ways to turn things around. When we were children we didn’t understand that every action had a consequence. We just went for things with much excitement. While it is a good idea to consider the consequences before we act, it is not a good idea to overthink it. If we overthink things after all signs point to yes, then we take the chance of losing the enthusiasm to act. There will never be “the best time” to act. Sometimes we need to revert back to our childlike way of thinking and just jump then figure things out on the way. That is how we learn. The lessons are in the journey. What if we allowed the rain to deter us from continuing our road trip? We would have not been able to arrive at a beautiful sunny beach and create wonderful family memories. We didn’t overthink the current rainy weather, we just continued to drive.

2. Trusting The Unknown: We tend to have a fear of failure because of the unknown. But how often do you question the food you are about to put in your mouth at your favorite restaurant? You didn’t prepare it or see it be prepared so how do you know it is safe to eat? It would be pretty ridiculous if we lived our life questioning every bite we eat, right? Then why question your own capability and decision making skills? When you find yourself questioning a decision you are about to make, create a list of great outcomes that derived from your decision making skills. Focus on the fact that you have previously executed great decisions and you can do it again!

3. Blissful Happiness: While children may wake up in the mornings a little sluggish, how often do they wake up worried about money, bills, or what they are going to eat. Parents usually satisfy these needs and provide a sense of security for their children enabling them to not worry about these things. I find the best way to stop the worrying and be happy in the present is to count my blessings. Now, this doesn’t mean children aren’t spoiled and that they wake up each morning counting their blessings. I simply mean that they wake up trusting that things are there for them. When you are blissfully happy not only do you attract higher quality people into your life, you attract more abundance. I once watched a TED Talk where Shawn Anchor speaks about how we are trained to scan the world for the negative. When we do this, it puts us in a negative mindset thus we are drawn to negative things. To reverse those effects, starting a gratitude journal helps us shift our mindset to become happier and positive.

How you conduct your personal life will trickle into your business life. Working on your mindset and character can have tremendous benefits for your entire life. Be sure to check out our recommended list of personal development books to enrich your life. Many can be found on Audible so you can listen while you drive.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Be sure to comment below about some of the ways you keep fear and negative thinking at bay. Then share this post on social media!