5 Things You Can’t Do For Yourself

Have you seen that new commercial from Staples? I absolutely love it! It’s about a small business owner named Dave who is the one and only person responsible for, well, just about everything that needs to get done. (If you haven’t seen it, you can watch it here.)

Because we have to be so self-sufficient as entrepreneurs, it’s easy to fall into the trap of feeling like you do indeed have super human abilities — and that you can do it “all” without any help from others. But in reality, no matter how multi-talented, committed or hardworking you are, there are some things you will never be able to do for yourself.

Here are five.

See your blind spots. By their very definition, blind spots are the things in your business (and your life) that are keeping you stuck. And YOU absolutely cannot see them. They are the things written on your forehead, at the tip of your nose and pinned to your back that no matter how hard you cross your eyes or twist in two, they are and will forever remain just beyond your line of sight.
Call yourself out on all your crap. Yeah, I said it. And you know it’s true. We all have it. Excuses. Bad habits. Irrational fears. Hang-ups. Justifications. Rationalizations. Natural defenses. Distractions. These things may seem small in isolation, but add them up and they can sabotage your success.
Be an objective sounding board. Try as we might to remain impartial in our businesses, we can never completely separate our emotions from our decisions — unless, perhaps, we’re a Vulcan. (Yes, that was a Star Trek reference.) The risk is that we sometimes follow our hearts rather than our brains, which can lead us down paths where we throw good money after bad, say yes when we should say no (or vice versa), or tolerate things we know we shouldn’t.
Push yourself beyond your comfort zone. Yes. Many of us solo business owners push ourselves. To extremes. (Guilty!) But no matter how much we may drive ourselves to the outer edge of our own comfort zones, if WE are the ones doing the pushing then it’s virtually impossible to go beyond the line that’s established by none other than our subconscious self… no matter how much we might like to believe that’s not true.
See things from a different perspective. Most of us try to be open-minded. We pride ourselves on the fact that we consider multiple sides of a problem. See things in a different light. The funny thing about our brains, however, is that over our lifetime they get pre-programmed with how to process information and make decisions. We run on autopilot. Even when we think we don’t.
So, if this is the case, what can you do about it? Well, you can’t change it. However, you can create support systems in your business that can do for you what you cannot do for yourself.

The three support systems I recommend you have are:

A coach that you have access to one on one
A mastermind group of equally committed individuals
An accountability partner
Ever since building these three support systems into my business, I’ve come to realize that I should and can never be without them. (And for those of you who have watched my business change and grow dramatically over the last six years, you’ve witnessed firsthand the outward results of me investing in these types of resources.)

When you’re choosing your own support systems, I recommend that you take into consideration where you are in your business and what your goals are. Most importantly, I encourage you to work with people who you feel you can trust and who genuinely and deeply care.