Wasting Time - Money Is The Greatest Of All Distractions!
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I like it a lot when I make a mistake and learn from it. You know, when you finally “get it” and start moving forward? That I like even more! Everything falls into place, energy flows, you feel more creative, and get more things done, in less time. It’s like a puzzle, sometimes you have to try and make mistakes in order to get it right the next time.
Money - My Greatest Distraction?
One mistake I made in the past, was to worry too much and too often about money. Especially when I quit my day job, almost 3 years ago, and started working on my own business(es). All the time spent worrying about money, was time not well spent. Time I could’ve used to do something else, something more constructive, more productive. To me, money was a distraction!
Of course, less distractions means better productivity, more things done, which can lead to more revenues, so why worry about money then? I guess because we tend to worry about useless stuff.
When I started really working online about 2 years and a half ago, me and my partner were putting a lot more money into our online business than we were actually making, negative ROI. We were emptying our bank accounts (almost), in the hope of making money, and be comfortable enough to stop worrying about our finances. But, of course, that made me worry even more about money. How can one focus on a business and worry about money? Doesn’t work!
It should be the other way around actually. The more concerned your are about your finances, the less money you’ll make, so I stopped worrying about that, stopped spending that much money on a business that was obviously not working.
You Already Know The Solution To A Problem, You Just Don’t Know It Yet!
So after that episode, I realized I needed a plan! Or at least some kind of plan or solution. That was time well spent! My business plan is not bulletproof, and changes every month, but the time invested in writing and thinking about this business plan paid off! Greatly!
It’s not so much writing or thinking about that business plan that helped me, but just to stop worrying about my finances. That definitely helped!
For me, worrying about money is exactly the same as watching TV (I like to call it the idiot box), it’s just one more thing to distract me from reaching my goals!
We live in a fast paced world, and we get distracted so easily, sometimes without even being aware of it. Cell phones, e-mails, PDAs, TV, are useful and fun, but can also distract you. Money can distract you, it happened to me. But once you know that, things can only get better. Sometimes your mind will play tricks on you, ya know!
What Is YOUR Greatest Distraction?
I would like to ask you, what was or still is your greatest distraction(s)? Feel free to write a mile long reply, I like long replies, let’s start a conversation, let’s about it! :)
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30 Responses to “Wasting Time - Money Is The Greatest Of All Distractions!”
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[…] What is your Greatest Distraction? - Jonathan wrote about his greatest distraction. You guess what it is! Moreover, he offers good advices in life. […]
Yes … like in your case sometimes bad thoughts can distract me for a long time, but I didn’t realized that these where distractions until I read this post.
Another this that can distract me is YouTube videos. For example I find something interesting on youtube, and then I start to browse in related videos, or responses to videos, and I waste time.
I’m sure that I have many things that distract me, but I don’t remember them right now.
Michael, in my case bad thoughts about money or other things can really distract but youtube is close to the top of the distractions list that’s for sure.
Honestly, the computer itself is a huge distraction in terms of getting other things done. I do useful things on the computer, but I spend WAY too much time sitting in front of it.
The computer is also a huge distraction, but when you get things done while sitting in front of it, it’s fine. Anthony, how many wordpress themes have you created? ;)
Good post. Worrying in general is like staying up at night thinking about going to the bathroom, and then going to bed with a full bladder.
Often the reason we worry is because we try to make predictions about the future. The problem is you can’t predict the future, and all that worrying is a waste time. A good tool to combat excessive worrying is to write down your predictions or worries on a calendar, and as time passes see how many of the actually come true.
I apologize in advance for for the therapy session…
Buxr, I don’t mind the therapy session at all! I like the bathroom metaphor a lot!
Good tip! Writing our worries on a calendar, I will definitely try that.
Meanwhile I’ve discovered some new things that I spend a lot of time …
Fifa 2007 - I love this game, and I could play this game in multiplayer for a long time.
Digg …there is the center of the internet, and if you want surfing from link to link you could waste a whole day, because you can find a lot of interesting stuff, and when you are done, you just find out that there where submitted another 1000 new stories.
haha, totally, same happens to me with StumbleUpon, although the more I use SU the more traffic I get on my blog, so it’s worth it.
I can spend hours playing old Snes games like Zelda, Metroid, Chrono Trigger, Secret Of Mana. It’s been a while I haven’t played though.. humm, craving! :)
I think what distracts me most is my e-mail. Even though I have it set up to make a noise whenever I receive a new message, I just have to open my inbox and “Check Mail.” I can’t wait that five minutes for it to automatically check for new messages on its own, you know. Crazy, huh?
But I think money is definitely a distraction for me as well. I sit and think about how much I’ve earned this week/month as opposed to how much I’ve received. I start freaking out that I won’t hit my “goal” income. It’s very counterproductive but reality, nonetheless.
Brenda, hehe so I’m not the only one I guess! I can check my e-mails 50 times in a day, and I get around 120 e-mail everyday on average, not all of those e-mails I will answer, but still I read ‘em all. And usually try to reply within 2 days depending on my work load.
Shoemoney posted a link to a stupid little online flash game called desktop tower defence … I hate him for it. lol
Spent way too much time playing it. :)
hahaha, Shane, I think we played the same game, I spent quite some time playing it, not productive really!
hum… maybe that’s how probloggers get to the top, share some couterproductive stuff with your readers, so this way you’ll get more things done while they play games hehe
internet is my biggest distraction…I can’t live without and with it around I hardly can do anything else…at work especially…hahhaha :D
ermmm and mostly I worried when things are uncertain…it could be hard to make a decision when everything is so blurry like :(
Sexyinred, haha, so that’s not really productive, at my last job they blocked internet access, but of course some people would find holes in the system and get on the internet anyway.
Uncertainty is a huge distraction, a little like my “money distraction”, not sure how and when I would’ve been able to pay the bills and stuff like that, that kinda thing really gets in the way, you can’t get much done when you worry too much about that sorta things.
It’s so weird, but I have never worried about money even while having none and facing staggering bills. Money means absolutely nothing to me. That doesn’t mean I don’t need it or don’t want to earn a lot of it. I too want to make a living working on line and right now I’m learning more about just how I would like to accomplish that. I am also a guitarist and I played professionally in several bands for years. Now I just play for my own enjoyment and write and record also. I have had jobs ranging from minimum wage to $90,000 per year and everything in between. I quit my life long dream job on principle. It was truly heart breaking and to this day I wish it had turned out differently. Out of all the money blogs out there, this is one of the only ones I can relate to simply because you add personality to your posts and keep it real. I just wrote a post about why I quit my dream job, building and designing guitars I think you might like. Good job Jonathan, I’ll be reading and I wish you great success:)
Bobby, thank you so much, wow!
I can totally relate to your post, I wrote a mile long reply, hope I didn’t go too off-topic :)
I would love to hear your music by the way!
[…] sure to have a looksie at Jonathan’s post about money and wasting time worrying about making money. It’s an insightful post and a very good […]
Hey Jonathan, I love long comments! When someone leaves a long comment that means you did something right. I’ll send you a song a friend recorded on his computer recently. This is one of his first guitar instrumentals and he asked me to play a solo on it. It’s not perfect but he put forth a solid effort and I was proud to solo for him. I checked out your 2 videos, sounds nice. Great tone and the sound quality of the videos was very good. I played in a lot of bands in late 80’s where guitar players were actually as important as the singer. I miss the good ol’ days but great guitar playing and solos on songs still has a place today.
Hi Bobby, can’t wait to hear the song! I think you already have my e-mail address (in the comment on your blog).
II can totally relate to your post, seems like we share similar experiences. A good teacher is one that will help students find their own voice, of course theories and mechanics are important ,but never as important as helping the student find his/her own sound and voice ;)
When I first started blogging I wasted so much time checking my stats and trying to analyse them. I would get excited with each ne unique hit, now the novelty has worn off (lol) i bet i have gained an extra two hours per week!
Andy
[…] Wasting time - Money Is The Greatest of All Distractions at Smart Wealthy Rich […]
Andy, it was the same for me, now I have no idea what my “real” alexa and technorati ranks are, and the traffic I get, no idea what’s my “real” traffic numbers. Not that I mind though hehe but I quit wasting time checking my stats 20 times a day
[…] wrote a great article over at Smart Wealthy Rich entitled ‘Wasting time - money is the greatest of all distractions!‘. In the article, Jonathan advises us to worry less about the money and more about […]
Jonathan… First, thanks for the link on your links page under business. As for distractions… e-mail and spending time online. My business is internet driven. However, I don’t get away from it enough to enjoy other things in life.
Hi David, you’re more than welcome for the link, it’s a great blog you have, lots of useful infos! ;)
E-mails are definitely a distraction, even when you run an online business. Gotta take breaks sometimes, and re-focus.
my 2 biggest distrations are checking emails too often and playing solitaire while waiting for a page to download.
Marie
Marie, same here, e-mails are definitely a distraction, and from the comments on my post I’m guessing a lot of people think the same.
It’s been a while I haven’t played solitaire hehe, rarely wait for something to download
Excellent Post. I ‘ve spent time chasing after money and once in a while actually manage to grab a few bucks. I find I’m happier when I keep things simple and am satisfied with what I have. I’m able to better focus on those things which bring joy to my life such as spending time with my wife and children, reading, writing and working.
Hey Scott, exactly the same for me. At some point I realized worrying about money wasn’t helping me making more. I stopped worrying and all of the sudden everything started making more sense. More time to focus on productive, fun, and empowering things, more time for my music, business(es), friends, familly.