I haven’t flown in a while, but I remember when I do they always ask me if I want a window seat or an aisle seat at the check in counter. I guess that’s the airline industry’s effort to frame the question so as to elicit their desired response. But as far as I’m concerned, they’re asking the wrong question. Window or aisle doesn’t matter so much to me, but I’d like to sit in the exit row because it has extra legroom.

If you haven’t gotten around to starting your online business, it might be because you’re asking yourself the wrong question. You might be asking yourself: Which book should I read next? Which seminar should I attend next? What’s next overhyped get-rich-quick product I should buy?

That’s the wrong question. You should be asking yourself: Why haven’t I gotten off my a$$ and actually done anything with the knowledge I already have? Will I sit on my a$$, thinking about it and doing nothing, and wondering why other people succeed while I don’t?

As long as you keep asking yourself the wrong question, you’ll never make any money online. Things can’t possibly change until you get off your butt and put some skin in the game. Sure that involves some risk but I just read a quote from Ray Kroc that applies here: “If you’re not a risk taker, you should get the hell out of business.” He’s right. There’s nothing wrong with having a job and working for someone else. It’s just not for me. Whether it’s for you is a decision for you to make.

There’s nothing wrong with reading books as long as you apply what you learn by actually using the knowledge you gain. But don’t make a career of reading books and let reading books prevent you from taking action. You’ll never know everything and you’re going to make mistakes so just get over it and get started.

You’ll learn exponentially faster by doing than by reading. Let me give you a personal example. When I bought my first house I read a book…one book, not 10 or 20 books. Then I looked in the real estate section of the newspaper and found a first-time homebuyer seminar being offered by a real estate agent. Of course he was running the seminars to drum up business but he got my business as I ended up buying a house a few weeks later.

A few years later, I read a book on real estate investing…again one book, not 12. My house had appreciated so I finally saw the light about how to make money investing in real estate like I had never seen it as a renter. Again I looked in the real estate section of the newspaper and there was a seminar for real estate investors so I went. It was $50 and I learned some things I never would have read in any book. There was actually a Real Estate Investors Association (REIA) in town and they had meetings every month. I also met a guy there who is now an appraiser and we’re still friends today.

At the REIA meetings I met more people and learned more about real estate investing. I learned from people who were actually doing it, not people who were writing books about it. And I got to actually speak to them and ask specific questions, not just read the words they wrote in a book. And more importantly, I learned from people who were doing it in my town and knew about that market and knew other real estate professionals (appraisers, attorneys, termite inspectors, carpenters, home inspectors, etc.). Most of the things I learned there I would have never learned in a generic book aimed at a mass audience. And a few months later I did my first real estate deal.

Don’t lose sight of the point because my personal example involves real estate investing. There was another example I read in a book a while back although I don’t remember the title. In any event, the teacher of a pottery class split his class into two groups. He told one group their grade would be determined on the basis of the number of pots they made during the semester. The quality of the pots did not matter, only the sheer number of pots created. The other group was told they only needed to make one pot and their grade would be determined based on the quality of that one single pot.

Interestingly, at the end of the semester, the group that produced the large volume of pots also produced pots of much higher quality than the group that was being graded on quality. Who knows why but presumably the group that was being graded on volume didn’t spend any time “thinking about it.” Instead they just started doing and learned from their mistakes until they created high-quality pottery. The other group instead of developing their pottery skills by actually making pottery probably studied all aspects of making high quality pottery. They spent too much time studying and too little time actually doing.

The same applies to making money online. You’re only going to learn so much from reading books. So if you’re not making money online yet, it’s time to either get off your butt and do something or admit to yourself that you’re not really serious. The answer is not to study and learn more - although you should constantly be studying and learning. The simple fact is that you’ll learn more and succeed faster when you actually get off your butt and do something.

Tags: Domain Names, Make Money Online

Popularity: 18% [?]

Share this post: