We always have dreams. We have dreams of what it would be like to travel to the most exotic locations; live in the luxurious homes; own beautiful cars.

Looking back I remember sitting at my work desk and imagining what my life could be like. Although it was a dream, I never thought that it could become my reality.

Like everyone else, I was conditioned to work as hard as I could to make as much money as I could at my 9-5 job.

I did not think that it was at all possible to make an income online and become a true entrepreneur. I thought that type of lifestyle was for the people who already had it.

Maybe they were lucky to know and understand the internet (which at the time I did not) or born into a wealthy family. Wealth was just something I imagined and did not think could be mine.

How I Created My Fate

My view however started to change when network marketing discovered me. I did not go searching for it because I did not know it existed.

That was the first time that I dreamt and realised that my dreams of entrepreneurship, could possibly come true.

Sometimes things happen in your life that cause doors to open. You do not really ask for it but I have learnt that unconsciously we attract the things that we consciously think about.

Therefore, it made sense that on that day when I “dreamt” about travelling the world and having luxurious things, I was building my fate.

I would say that joining network marketing was the best thing that could happen to me.

It allowed me to have a positive outcome in life. I found ways to motivate myself and looked up to people for inspiration.

I made friends who supported me and entered circles of like-minded people. When you surround yourself with good things, it is inevitable that good things will always happen to you.

Passing Through The Struggles

But let me stop. I do not want to paint a rosy picture because it was not at all easy.

My first encounter with network marketing was with a company called Herbalife. It was a brief encounter because I simply was not familiar with how it worked. I also did not have guided support so I did not really know what I was doing.

On reflection, I was creating excuses.

It soon became clear that if you really wanted something you would go after it. That you created your own destiny. Whether your life changed was up to you and you alone.

Therefore, when I said that I did not have support, that was an excuse. What I should have done then was go out and find support. There are so many Facebook groups that offer support; there were so many YouTube videos that gave motivation.

Had I known then what I know now, I would have reached a further position in my business but hey, we become wiser learning from our mistakes.

So being a Herbalife distributor, I learned about network marketing for the first time. It meant that I had to be sociable, be able to build relationships and that simply was foreign to me. Being in a place where you felt alone everyday it was nearly impossible for me to trust or expose myself to relationships.

I could never imagine walking up to someone and starting a conversation with them. That is what network marketing involved at that time. I say at that time because later on I would tell you how my network marketing business transformed.

That is exactly what my leaders told me to do and when you are just starting and trying to rise to the top, you really need someone who would coach you. Not just a member of the team but a mentor. Someone who went through the mistakes before and who you could learn from. Someone who can shorten your learning curve.

That is what was missing and what caused me to quit Herbalife. I was not motivated nor did I have any inspiration to keep going.

I thought that it was too hard but the reality was, it simply was not for me. What I did not want to do was step outside of my comfort zone and maybe, had I been prepared to do so, I could have been successful two years ago.

Change Does Not Mean You Are Quitting

Even though you may have quit one direction, it does not mean that you have given up on yourself.

I now had a taste of what network marketing was like and another opportunity found me.

I was sitting at my desk scrolling through Instagram when I came across a post of a young lady who spoke about making $500 in her first month on social media and being able to work from home.

This intrigued me because remember, after I ended Herbalife I now had an idea of what network marketing was like. I knew I had to sell a product but what piqued my interest more was the type of product. The product was a body wrap that claimed to tighten tone and firm in as little as 45 minutes.

At first, I did doubt that any product could do what it said but when I went home that day, I did a bit of research and found that this product was everywhere. It was a familiar product and it had great reviews.

So in pursuit of my goal to become my own boss and be an entrepreneur I joined my current network marketing company and got to work.  Update: I am no longer with this network marketing company but now educate people on how to start their own online business which you can check out here.

There Is No Such Thing As “Get Rich Quick”

Let me tell you the expectations I had for myself with this company and I hope you will realise that the expectations you think are not really what happens.

I expected to become wealthy in a short space of time. I gave myself 6 months. Unrealistic.

I expected to have instant sales.

I expected my phone to be ringing off the hook with potential customers.

In a nutshell, I expected that it would be fast and easy.

None of that happened.

In fact, it took me 8 months to promote to the first rank of my company, which would make me only $150/month and another 15 months to promote to the fourth rank of my company, which would make me an average of $1200/month.

Would you know that these are the actual averages that the company sets for average people like me to climb the ranks?

I had to do a lot of late nights and a lot of talking, trying to convince people to buy my product and I got a lot of rejection. I would say that 85% of the time when I asked people to buy my product, I was met with a no.

Over time, a “no” had little effect on me. I had to build up the thick skin so I did not feel offended and to overcome rejection.

If you do not have that thick skin especially when talking to people, then you can easily quit this type of business.

If You Have Not Failed Then You Have Not Lived

I really wanted this to work and to be truthful no one, not even close friends or family, knew what I went through emotionally to conquer the struggles. Talk about tears, few hours of sleep, frustration and anger. I went through it all but that is what most successful people have to go through.

Gaining success is not an easy thing but when you do achieve it, it would have been worth it.

For two years, I struggled in my network marketing business. What made me keep going was my why. Why I wanted success? I wanted to have the freedom to work for myself. I did not want to be stuck in an office for 8 hours every day of my life, missing out on life. That was not what I wanted and I wanted more.

I also saw other people doing it and being successful and I told myself that if they could do it so could I. What was different between them and me? Absolutely nothing. So why not me?

The pursuit of success, stuck in my mind and one advertisement on Facebook changed everything.

I believe in the law of attraction. I believe that when you consciously think about the goals you want for yourself, that the universe aligns itself with those goals and channels opportunities to help you achieve those goals.

That was exactly how my business transformed when an income producing opportunity discovered me. Once again, I did not go searching for it. This opportunity helped me open my mind to endless possibilities of how I could maximise my income goals.

It showed me ways in which I could automate my business and I soon realised that this was a system that was used by the top income earners of network marketing companies. That was the secret code and I suddenly cracked it!

Wisdom Comes From Mistakes

So I got to work. I learnt everything that my mentor taught me and implemented it. I made mistakes, tried, failed, tried, failed but just never gave up and here I am today – writing about my journey and helping other people like me create an income online and improve the performance of their business.

I am thankful for not giving up on myself but for having the strength to keep failing, being disappointed but picking myself back up and going.

Five months ago, after struggling in my business for 2 years, I have been able to quit my job and now live life on my own terms. My journey is by no means over because I have a lot more to learn; many more opportunities are coming to me and I see the vision of being able to grow exponentially and help others grow with me.

My Advice

My advice for you who are unsure whether you should take the plunge and start your own online business. Honestly, starting network marketing, despite having its difficulties, was the best decision that I ever made. Being able to quit my job and focus on what I loved was even better.

Every day I listen to motivational speeches that give me the drive to passionately pursue the dreams that I want to achieve. My belief in myself is so powerful that no one can talk me out of what I am doing. I have faith in God that he put me on this journey for a reason. Hopefully by now you have found the golden message to help you.

Motivation, passion and faith. Three things that you should work on to help you in your own journey. Eliminate the doubt, fear and negativity and see how far your life can go.

If you are ready to start your own online business then your next step is here.

The post My Journey To Entrepreneurship And Why I Started appeared first on I Am Dawn-Marie.

Let me tell you guys. It took me a good couple of months to write this blog post! LOL

And actually I am a little bit ashamed to say that. Every beginning of the week, I devote some time to channelling my mind so I can get in the zone to prepare my content for the week, but sadly a whole host of other things, steer me off track.

Have you ever sat down to do work and then your phone rings, you end up on Facebook with the scrolling syndrome, you open YouTube to see what’s new, then you completely lose track of time and soon it is the end of the day?

Yup.

I would say that that has been my situation for the past couple of months. I’ve just been in a funk where I don’t have the inspiration to work on my blog goals and I will tell you now, that this is normal.

If you feel like this too, then you’re not alone. Every entrepreneur whether they are just starting out or are full-fledged, go through this.

But of course, like everything else, there are things that you can put into practice to not make it the norm of your entrepreneurial journey and this is what I am going to share with you today.

In this blog post I am going to share with you 9 things I do to help me stay focused and discipline in my business as a solopreneur.

I hope you are able to take away a few things that you can use in your own business life and if you have any other tips be sure to share it in the comments.

1. Meditate to focus my mind

This is really one of the first things that I do before I start my day. I use meditation to calm my mind and visualise the life I want to design for myself.

But when I find myself flustered during the day, I may get anxious about not getting enough done, this is one the strategies that I use as well.

When I meditate I like to sit or lie down in a quiet room with a guided meditation track that I find from YouTube.

With these guided meditation exercises, you learn how to breathe deeply to relax your body. What that does for me is not only does it help rest my body, but my mind stops racing.

I start to focus my mind on a particular desire.

That really helps me to concentrate on my thoughts and this is when I start releasing good feelings about my well being, my present and my future.

The key to making meditation work for you, is to remove all thoughts that have empty meaning. If you are an overthinker it may take some time to get good at it, but I encourage you to not try meditation by yourself but with a guide who can talk you through your thoughts and help you to channel your mind to only have positive thoughts during your session.

My favourite meditation guide to follow on YouTube is Agnes Vivarelli. If you want to try others, simply do a search for “guided meditation” and you will find thousands.

2. Turn off the distractions   

It goes without saying that if you want to be productive in your entrepreneurial life you have to learn how to turn off things that distract you.

Some of those things might be your mobile phone. You may be someone who often gets text messages from friends and family and might be eager to reply to those messages right away.

Whenever you get a message resist the temptation to reply immediately. For me, what I normally practise is to turn my phone on silent and only check it during breaks.

When I silence my phone, no one can contact me during that time.

Even if turning your phone on silent may not be practical, because you want to avoid emergencies, another option is to check your messages from time to time but only respond to those that appear urgent.

Any other message gets put into the “to-do later” list at which point you are free to respond to those messages during your break time.

Facebook is another major distraction for some. It was for me a long time ago when every time I got a notification that someone commented on my post or tagged me in a post, I would immediately visit the site to see what was going on.

Now, to avoid these distractions I turn off any Facebook notifications when I am working. Let’s face it. Messages on Facebook will never be urgent so avoiding distraction here is an easy task.

The same for any other social media platform you are on. It’s a good thing that they invented the silent option for notifications so you don’t have to be disturbed by unwanted notifications.

Is there any other distractions that help you lose focus? At the end of the day, anyone can turn off distractions if they want to. Out of sight, out of mind.

So I encourage you to put away things that cause you to lose track and commit yourself to working diligently knowing that there will come the time when you can get back to those fun distractions when you take a break.

3. Play music to get in the mood

Playing music gets me in the mood to do anything and when I listen to my favourite tracks, it helps time to go by quickly as I hash out my task list.

Listening to music is almost therapeutic. It helps me to feel playful, happy and in a better mood.

And when I am in a better mood I can concentrate easily.

I find that music helps me to really immerse myself in the task. For example, sometimes writing a blog post is mundane but having background music rocking helps to bump my creativity and is effective at making what is considered boring work, more enjoyable.

Some may say that music is noisy and causes distraction, which may be true if you are playing music loudly, but try playing music quietly. See whether that makes a difference.

It may be beneficial to you to listen to music that you are familiar with, so you can dance along to tempos whilst you work on your next best strategy or create content.

But we can all agree that a good beat really gets us in a better mood. Like they say “music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything”.

4. Get an accountability partner who can keep you on track 

For most entrepreneurs who want to step up their game, an accountability partner is the one who motivates you and encourages you.

For me, my accountability partner and I keep in touch at least once a week where we discuss our achievements, what we’re doing in our business and what is working and not working.

Although I wouldn’t like to compare my efforts to hers, when I see that she is doing something brilliant that is getting her insane results, it kind of makes me want to be on the same level as her.

I don’t see this as competition but rather motivation. And motivation helps me to get back in my zone and focus.

Sometimes your entrepreneurial journey can be lonely. But when you have an accountability partner who goes through the highs and lows as you do, it can be a relief that you are not the only one facing these spells.

If you do not know where to find an accountability partner, join Facebook groups and make friends; network with other people in the group.

That’s exactly how I found my accountability partner. In a room full of men, she was a very active girl entrepreneur and when I saw that I immediately reached out to her and we agreed to be partners.

Sometimes who you may pair up with, may not be the best fit and that’s ok. Of course you resonate best with certain people so don’t feel like it has to be a forced partnership.

Whatever relationship you form, create it such that you can always go to them and really just chat. Their encouragement and words of wisdom can be what puts you back into your zone.

5. Take a break and clear your mind

Listen, it’s ok to take a break.

It’s ok to step away from your computer and just do absolutely nothing. Doing this helps to clear your mind and re-energise you to get back up and start doing.

When I take a break one of the things I like to do is go for a walk outside. By changing my environment, work is no longer on my mind.

Doing this not only helps to declutter your thoughts, but you also get to exercise your limbs a bit.

Remember, you may have been sat at your computer for hours.

You also get to reduce the strain on your eyes. So taking a break is always a good thing not only for your mental health but your physical health.

Other things that you can do on your break is exercise, read a book, sleep, etc.

Whatever you decide to do, let it be a step away from “work”.

When you do that you will find that you are more refreshed and ready to dive back into it, to get things done.

6. Create a task list and stick to it

When you have a million things to do in a day, it can get really overwhelming. What exactly are the most important tasks? What must you get done on that day?

When your day starts out hectic, spend the time either in the morning or the day before and prepare a task list of the things that need to be done.

One tactic is to put all the small tasks at the top of your list and all the difficult ones last. This helps to get the minor activities out of the way, so that the majority of your day you can spend on the harder tasks.

Also writing a task list gives you clear visibility as to what you need to do. When you don’t have a task list, you might feel flustered or confused.

It can also leave you overwhelmed when you try to do too many things at once. So the practise should be to tick things off your list as you go along.

By doing this, I find I am more productive and I feel more accomplished since I work in stride to complete everything on my list.

And if I happen to not complete everything, I write my task list for the next day so what was not completed today, can get completed the next day.

One key thing to note is that as an entrepreneur you should aim to do income generating tasks each day.

My income generating tasks are writing affiliate blog posts, setting up affiliate campaigns and seeking out clients. So I make sure that these things are done first thing in the morning.

Any other task that does not fall into the above category are considered unimportant and I may outsource them, or if I have the time to do it, I leave it for the last task on the list.

Structure your task list that way and you will see how much money you can earn in your business.

7. Have power hour sessions

Basically this concept is that you clear your schedule, devote two or more hours to work in an uninterrupted environment and just focus.

To do this, I make up my mind to put the effort in. Whether that means I lock myself away in my room, I turn off any way to communicate with me and I just get things done.

Sometimes I may have to mentally prepare myself for this and to do that I usually spend some time before having a break and then encourage myself to start with my power hour.

A power hour is best done the first thing in the morning, as you are often fresh and full of energy once you wake up.

Leave it for later in the day and you may find that you are burnt out and exhausted from other things that filled up your morning. By that time you may have no desire to implement power hour sessions.

If you are adding this technique to your list to help you become more productive, focus on doing the most important tasks during this time.

Make a commitment to work for a set number of hours, whether you keep a timer or clock in sight to keep track of time.

If you need to listen to music to ease the mood then do it. But one thing, is that there should be absolutely no distraction to help you complete the session.

8. Listen to your favourite motivational speaker

This is one of my best ways to boost productivity and it also helps me to shift my mindset from doubt to having a can-do attitude.

If you ever feel sceptical about your ability to create or achieve something and that keeps you back from ever starting, I recommend that you listen to motivational speakers.

The vibrance and forcefulness of these speakers in the way that they deliver their message, jolts me out of my comfort zone and spurs me right into action. It’s almost as if they are speaking directly to me.

For me, when I listen to these motivational speakers I feel a connection to their words. I feel inspired into action and what was once procrastination is now completed after finally just doing it.

I suppose that’s what motivational speakers are there for. They really help to encourage you to let go any doubt, fear or resistance you had and just go for it.

So anytime you are putting other trivial matters ahead of those tasks that are important to your business, try turning on a motivational podcast, absorb the content and see whether it makes a difference.

I do not have any favourite motivational speakers, but I do find audio tracks to listen to on YouTube. I search for “motivational speakers” and thousands of results come up.

9. Resist procrastination and just do it

It couldn’t be said better and any more simpler than this – “just do it”.

There is really no secret to being more productive and focusing on doing something. You have to want to do it.

I suppose that you get more productivity if that thing you have to do, is something you love or something that you loathe.

Of course, I always tell people when they are starting a business, do something that you are passionate about.

Yes, it must be able to solve someone’s problems, you should be able to share value with your audience, but at the same time you must always do something that you love to do as it makes it easier to get in the mood when needed.

Don’t be afraid to shift direction from time to time.

If you have started a business, that doesn’t satisfy you or challenge you mentally and emotionally, then find something else.

Just because you are changing direction, does not mean that you are giving up on yourself. You may start with one business idea but then find that it does not give you joy. It does not give you satisfaction.

So it makes no sense to continue with it as you will always struggle to commit time to it which is what increases your productivity.

Start by understanding what it is, that you want to do and when you have found that and there is a sense of satisfaction, whenever you are not in the zone, talk yourself into just doing it!

Wrapping Up

Discipline is a personal choice. Even though I may make these recommendations, I cannot force you to apply my methods. It is your choice to make up your mind and make that commitment to yourself.

What makes these tasks easier on a daily basis, is knowing that by working on my goals each day, I am closer to achieving them. That knowledge incites more power and really helps me to invest the time needed to grow my business.

If my business is not growing then we have a problem and frankly it’s not a problem that I want to have.

I hope my guidance has given you the inspiration to focus on what matters to you.

Tell me in the comments what other things you do, to remain disciplined and gain focus in your entrepreneurial journey.

Cheers,

The post 9 Steps To Take To Increase Your Productivity appeared first on I Am Dawn-Marie.