Episode Transcript
How Do We Know What to Do?
Wouldn’t It Be Nice If We Could Tell the Future?
We’ve been working on a new website for our coaching and consulting business. This whole coaching and consulting thing is different than construction. I’m struggling to know what exactly it should include and how to say it clearly. I want this website to explain how we can help people build their construction business as clearly and directly as possible.
This isn’t the first time I’ve struggled with this. It was an issue when we built the Timber Creek Construction website.
The problem is, what makes the most sense to me may not be the clearest or most understandable to others. Not to mention that five different people will have five different opinions. It even gets more confusion when these five people are “professional marketers”.
So, how do I know what to do?
It would be great if someone knew the future and could tell me exactly what to do. What words to write and where to put them. What information, pictures, diagrams, etc.
Wouldn’t it be great to have a “Genie in a Bottle” that could tell what will happen.
The phrase “Genie in a Bottle” is evocative, brimming with fantasy and the alluring promise of wish fulfillment. But beyond the initial images of magical beings and granted desires, lies a much deeper metaphorical meaning. Things like power, control, freedom, and the often unforeseen consequences of manipulating fate.
The “Gene in a Bottle” metaphor represents far more than just a fantastical scenario. It touches upon fundamental human aspirations and the potential pitfalls of unchecked ambition. It forces us to confront the inherent complexities of desire, the delicate balance between free will and destiny, and the responsibility that comes with wielding any form of power.
But what if my genie and yours don’t see eye to eye on how things should be done? This could lead to chaos.
I’ve been working on coaching and consulting for years and am not where I thought I would be by now. Does this mean I should quit and just stick with construction? Maybe but I don’t think so.
This whole coaching/consulting began after my accident in 2012. The fall I took could have broken my back. I could have been incapacitated and not been able to do construction work. As I was recovering I asked myself what I would do if that had happened.
The answer that came to me was that I could have used my years of business experience to help other people in construction build their businesses.
As I thought about it, I remembered how a lot of different sub-contractors and competitors asked me questions about the different systems and processes that I used and where I got them. There were even times when I was asked by other contractors to do construction proposals for them.
This led me to think about all the construction people out there who needed help building their businesses. Maybe I could help them. I wouldn’t have to wait until I was disabled to do it.
Then doubt set in!
What made me think that I could do this? Who was I kidding, I knew how to do construction, not coach someone else.
I spent a lot of time asking myself if coaching and consulting was what I was supposed to do. After a lot of prayer and asking friends, family and business associates … it was clear that this is what God wanted me to do.
This didn’t mean that I immediately knew what to do.
Slowly, I began to work on how this would look and what it would include. It’s a slow process because I still was doing construction. I needed something to generate cash flow.
There have been a lot of times over the past twelve years that I’ve asked myself if I had made the right choice. Maybe I should just go back to focusing on construction.
Then I would get reassurance from God, family, friends, or some new turn of events.
One of the things that changed my life after the accident was the book The Traveler’s Gift by Andy Andrews. In this fictional book, David Ponder has lost his job and the will to live. When he is supernaturally selected to travel through time, he visits historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln, King Solomon, and Anne Frank. Each visit yields a Decision for Success that will turn his life around and one day impact the world.
One of these seven decisions is to persist without exception. In this adventure David finds himself in a place filled with things that were never finished because someone gave up. They didn’t persist.
We need to persist without exception and not give up.
This is what I say when I doubt myself.
Maybe it’s better that we don’t know the future. Otherwise, we would miss the adventure.
Life is a journey, not a destination.
Even though I don’t have all the answers, I’m going to take the first next step and go work on the website.
I’m going to persist!
If you would like help building your construction business, schedule a free 30-minute call or check out some of the previous blogs and podcasts at Solution Building.
