View from the Summit

I’m a tough guy. Yeah, right. Sometimes even now, after thirty-seven years of entrepreneurship, I want to crawl in the corner, face the wall, and escape to a place where I don’t have to face reality. There are so many hurdles to overcome, hoops to jump through, and choices to make that often I feel overwhelmed.

It appears in many situations that there is not

an optimum outcome, just the lesser of two evils.

As I evaluate what I’m experiencing, I don’t see the light, I don’t have the energy, and I feel defeated. I trick myself and say I will deal with this later, tomorrow will bring clarity.

It was around 1990 I was pretty involved in buying real estate. I had bought a condo on the south side of Nashville called Paragon Mills. It was a foreclosure, and the profit was going to be pretty sweet. I held it a couple years to take full advantage of the capital gains tax vs. ordinary income. After advertising it for a couple months, a buyer surfaced, oddly enough, I knew him. We were by no means friends; he was just a local business person that had been very successful in his career (locals would know him if I used his real name). To protect the guilty, we will call him John. 

To make a really long and complicated chain of events much shorter, I will just go straight to the bottom line.

He cheated me out of $40,000 using a technicality that was hidden deep in the contract, unknown to anyone but him.

Guilt is the fact of having committed a specified or implied offense or crime. Guilt can be a show stopper and a game changer no doubt.  It’s a natural built in human emotion that can be very beneficial if we listen. I welcome healthy guilt; it keeps me from repeating an offense.  There is no point in me asking you if you have ever felt guilty, sure you have.

How did you deal with it, or have you?  If not, you could be paralyzed. 

Over the years, I have done and said some boneheaded things. Most of the time I knew I had messed up the moment I did, but often it's later when the revelation comes. Sometimes we are completely in the dark of a misspoken word, standby, you will get to deal with this situation at a later date.

After doing a small self-evaluation, it has brought a few noteworthy tips to the surface. Many times we make simple strategies very complex and complicated. There are a few common sense approaches that work wonders, whether you are dealing with family members or colleagues. Life can be very successful and significant if you are proactive in your approach. This post was intended to be short and actionable. Give these a try and watch what happens!