👂’I’ll be happy when…’ I hear this time and again. Do you find yourself thinking it too?
I’ll be happy when:
- We hit a $xxxm in ARR
- I sell the business
- I work out these differences with a challenging board member / exec / co-founder / customer / spouse
- I hire / fire this person
- I’ve paid off the mortgage
- We get VC investment
- I get control over the market / the competition
The problem is what happens when the ‘when’ does or doesn’t take place. You can carry the same feelings of uncertainty or unfulfillment forward that you thought would go, or more often than not, another ‘when’ appears.
The solution?
- Work out what it is that is making you feel that uncertainty, it’s probably deeper than the surface level ‘whens’ up there. (Here’s a clue if you are like me it’s about CONTROL of uncertainty, an impossibility!)
- Work out what it is that makes you happy, that you enjoy, that is fulfilling and just do more of that. Throw out the unfulfilling.
I know what isn’t the solution; Money.
💰 Money is fuel, it gets you to a destination but it’s never the destination. Let me leave you with this story.
The writers Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller were at a glamorous party outside New York City. Standing in the palatial second home of the billionaire host, Vonnegut began to needle his friend. “Joe,” he said, “how does it feel that our host only yesterday may have made more money than your novel has earned in its entire history?”
“I’ve got something he can never have,” Heller replied.
“The knowledge that I’ve got enough.”
Story from Ryan Holiday
So I ask you. What would your answer be to ‘I know I have enough when…’ ?
💬 Leave a comment or drop me an email, I’d love to hear from you joe@mrjoe.uk