It’s Not the Money, Honey: The Real Purpose of Business

It’s Not the Money, Honey: The Real Purpose of Business

Business Point

I don’t care what the Donald says. The point of business is not to make money. The purpose of business is to expand who you are through what you do. And use profit to achieve a more noble end (and yes, self-development is a noble end).

I believe this because the worth of any business resides largely in it’s human capital (the value of its people) and in it’s intellectual property (the value of the ideas generated by it’s people). People make a business great, and they do so by being provided a vehicle to express who they are, and to create.

It’s this expression of our inner Self that is the real purpose of business, and our ticket to wealth.

There’s No Money In It

There’s No Money In It

StarvingArtist

It’s not worth the chance.

Go ahead and believe that. Please, continue to agree to your belief that doing what you love will never bring you the wealth you desire.

Please, go on upholding the premise that creating a career from your passion, and fulfilling your physical, mental and spiritual needs, isn’t a recipe for financial gain.

Now, stop and think about this rationally.

Is it logical to believe that you can make more money doing something you tolerate, rather than do something you are gifted at? Wouldn’t a person have far greater long-term earning potential if they used their talents, and expressed their beliefs about life in their work, rather than say, got some job with a steady paycheck?

Sure, you might make more money right away with the office job, and while it might feel like a safer choice, I can’t think of anything more risky than denying your true needs. When has that ended up well for anyone?

Do you really buy the starving artist bullshit?

Do yourself a favour and stop undercutting your Self and your value by believing in the idea that passion. purpose. creativity. joy. hard work. don’t provide and make you wealthy. What makes you think money is so hard to obtain?

Money is a current, an energy. If your not open to it, it won’t come your way.

Give your wealth and you’ll receive it back.

If you are serious about doing what you love and making money too, believe that you can, and, with patience, do the work so you do.  It’s all up to you. But understand that doing the work doesn’t mean just creating, it means connecting too. Half your job is marketing. You aren’t just a [fill in the blank], your a business owner too. Just because you build it doesn’t mean they will come.

You need to identify the whackjobs that find value in what you do. If you don’t, you’ll be right, and you will be starving.

Please let me know how romantic you find it.

photo by: Stephen Poff

Borrowing Money

Borrowing Money

AccessMe
I’m in debt. And I have been for most of my adult life.

I see debt as means to an end.

There was a brief point in my life when I managed to pay off my first round of debt – this one due to attending university and post-graduate school. But my next round of debt started soon after, when I decided to leave my job and travel for half a year with my now-husband-then-boyfriend. And, subsequently, start a business with the money.

I never think that money is an excuse for me not do something. I see debt as access to possibilities beyond my external reach. I see credit cards and debt as a real gift in our culture. It gives people access to create money for them Self. It allows us the freedom to make the right choices for our Self and add to our wealth. A not every person is afforded that choice.

I know many people abuse it’s power, but that doesn’t mean I have to. I choose to appreciate debt for the opportunity it is and mange it mindfully.

photo credit: Lou Rouge

A Not-So-Simple Recipe for Creating Your Dream Business

A Not-So-Simple Recipe for Creating Your Dream Business

Dream Recipe

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Prepare Your ‘Being’

1. Realize you have a choice.

In everything you do. You are a hero in your own journey.

Be the fucking hero you are. Choose to serve your higher nature.

2. Embrace change and uncertainty.

Or don’t.

Either way it’ll be happening around you and through you. Might as well learn to work with it.

3. Be the ‘Master of Your Domain’.

Stop reacting to opportunities ‘out there’. Instead, act from a place of inner knowledge of who You Are. What’s ‘out there’ is an effect, not a cause. You are the means to create new opportunities. You create the market, the market doesn’t create you.

Combine #1, #2, & #3 to discover your Innerpreneur.

Prepare Your ‘Doing’

1. Find an “engaging” activity.

Do something that challenges you, and is creative. It’ll create a “flow experience” in you. Seriously.

It’ll activate this part of your brain called the nucleus accumbens, which controls how you feel about life.

And it’ll stimulate your septal zone. That’s your “feel good” area – it’ll make you feel happy.

2. Find a “meaningful” activity.

Use what you are best at to serve others, or to participate in a cause bigger than yourself.

Combine #1 & #2 to design your happiness.

Combine ‘Being’ and ‘Doing’ to Create Your Dream Business

In knowing who You Are you will find the freedom to discover the mix of creating and contributing that is Your Innerpreneurial dream.

photo credit: Patrick Q

Design Happiness

Design Happiness

Design Happiness
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“What if we looked at the world as a design project – how might we begin to make it better?” – Bruce Mau

Design is not just aesthetics. It doesn’t exist for business, culture, or nature; business, culture, and nature exist because of it.

It’s not making stuff pretty. Design is solving problems and changing lives. Design is applying your creativity strategically. And because of new technological advances, our increased sharing of knowledge, and our ingenuity, it’s now possible to design everything.

And when I say everything, I mean it. I’m not just talking about your stuff, I’m not just talking about matter. I’m talking about You, your existence, I’m talking about designing meaning.

Design defined.

To design (with a sense of purpose) is to:

  1. understand what is needed
    AND
  2. satiate that need

It’s really that simple.

Design is You breaking out of old patterns of thinking and behaviour. Design is You being empathetic and conscious to human needs and desires. Your own, and others.

Do it. Design it.

You can design your dream day if you understand what you desire and fulfill it.
You can design your dream business if you understand what you need and quench that need.
You can design your dream website if you understand what you require and execute it.

You can design the meaning of your life. And business. And everything in-between. You have the choice and the talent.

You won’t have to do it alone.

There’s a personal design revolution afoot. Some of us don’t want design done for us. We want it done with us or by us.

We want to use our imagination. We want to apply our creativity strategically.

We’re choosing to design our world like no one else can.

photo by: photographer padawan *(xava du)