The road from follow-your-passion to thriving business can be a bumpy one. Once you realize “if you build it, they will come” isn’t a business strategy, it’s tempting to spend every waking hour tweaking, writing, emailing, networking, and trying to push through.

“…while you’re doing it, doing it, doing it, there’s something much more important that isn’t getting done.”
— Michael E Gerber, The E-Myth Revisited

Busyness isn’t business.

Don’t confuse the two. You can work until you’re blue in the face and still not succeed. That’s not to say that hard work doesn’t or won’t pay off. But is what you’re spending your day doing really getting you one (or better, a few) steps ahead? Are your daily actions tuned to the goal you’ve set in front of you?

Check yourself.

Your goal can’t be to work yourself to the bone. The sense of accomplishment you’ve been missing won’t come from just checking tasks off a list.

What you’re missing is progress, the sense that what you’re doing matters in the larger scheme of things.

Being busy doesn’t level the learning curve. Being busy doesn’t create ease. Being busy doesn’t create satisfaction.

Know where you want to go and create a plan to get there. Remove any and all unnecessary tasks and busy work. Take time off, explore, enjoy.

Have faith that your plan will take time and that doesn’t mean that you have to fill it with work that is meaningless.