I am a dreamer at heart. I love to dream about the possibilities of changes in my life. It’s what I call the ‘What ifs?’. Everyone one does this of course. I’m not a psychologist but I’d guess a large portion of patients are those whose dreams have quite hit the mark of their expectations. Dreamers fall into 4 categories.
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Dreamed but gave up
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Dreaming but too fearful to try
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Dreaming, tried, but failed
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Dreaming, tried, and found success
So, the interesting thing to me is you can find yourself in one or more or all of these categories. I’ve found success in my career and in owning real estate but I’m struggling right now in my newest venture to buy an online business. Notice I didn’t say ‘start’ an online business. I believe my best chance of owning an online business is to buy into an existing business. But here’s the dilemma…
I’m not sure!
As many seasoned dreamers know, it is bliss to dream but it’s work to commit, especially to something you don’t yet have the skill set to do well enough to feel comfortable with to take the risk of spending hard earned capital.
So, as dreamers we wander in a perpetual cycle of reading, looking, watching, listening. In this cycle we mentally take in a lot of information.
Here’s where it gets mind numbingly stupid.
That is just my unprofessional way of saying the psychology of starting anything new that has risk of failure becomes a mind game. Risk has many manifestations or definitions to us individually. So, the mind works overtime to process all the information you’re taking in while blending in your life experiences (yes, the bad ones too!). And it comes up with what I call a behavioral risk score for you even if it’s not actually a number or formula or even based on reality. This is where most of us find ourselves, even those of us who have found some wins or successes in our journey.
We effectively never find a way to objectively determine risk.
Now, I will say from experience that I like to dream about things that have no merit(i.e. are not grounded in reality) like “What if I won the lottery or X amount of money?”. To be honest I like to go there sometimes. Hope is a powerful drug. It just doesn’t amount to significant change in your life once the “Dreamscape” fades.
So, where does that leave me and you other dreamers who are sincerely looking to change and willing to commit if you could really increase your chances of winning in the endeavor?
This is where dreamers and risk takers get sifted. And man, is that strainer restrictive or what? Risk takers know they have to find a way to objectively ground their dreams effectively turning down the volume of their behavioral scoring mechanism.
Systems to the rescue!
Successful risk takers know…
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No venture is 100% free of risk. But they know how to push the balance in their favor by using mechanisms or systems to evaluate risk objectively.
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They aren’t and can never be the expert in everything. So, they find ways to surround themselves with experts in the areas to help reduce risk. Networking can be useful here.
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Any new venture takes time. Too many of us dream about instant success. The internet has addicted us to dopamine hits allowing us to live out our own dreams thru the experiences of others.
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You have to build in small iterations to get to where your dreams become a reality. This usually is some form of a plan.
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Any journey will take longer than you expected because along the way you will be met with distractions and headwinds to your steps.
This is why they follow a system to research, assess, ditch or commit, plan, and execute.