Many years ago, prior to my first exposure to Multi-level Marketing, I was young, ambitious, and strapped to a hospital bed.
In the several days/week prior, I had taken my buddy's motorcycle and, in the span of no more than 50 yards, driven it into a telephone pole.
With no helmet (in my defense, it didn't fit and what was going to happen any way?), I broke my right femur (thigh bone) and was placed in skeletal traction.
And there I laid until my surgery.
Funny things happen to a young man when he is suddenly, rudely introduced to his own mortality and has nothing to do but reflect on past actions and future possibilities.
There I was lying in a hospital bed, it wasn't great, but I wasn't lying there in the waning days of my life, which was great.
How would that be? All that time to think back instead of ahead.
It was then I realized it wouldn't be bad if it was looking back on the life I anticipated living.
But I thought what if it wasn't, would that be bad? And as I wrestled with that one, I came to the conclusion that it wouldn't be bad if I, while I had been on the merry-go-round of my life, I had at least tried for the "Brass Ring".
For those of you not familiar with the "good ole" days, before you had to sign a waiver if there was ANY possibility of stubbing your toe, Merry-go-rounds (at least in arcade type places) had little shelf like things on the wall that brass rings were inserted into.
So as you went around you would have to time the height of your trusty steed, hold tight to the reins, and reach, and stretch to grab the "Brass Ring".
And if you got one, you turned it in for a prize.
They were not easy to get to say the least and more often than not, you did not get one.
Sometimes the only consolation was, at least you tried.
All alone in that hospital bed, I realized that the worst feeling in the world must be lying in that last hospital bed, maybe with, maybe without, the many trappings of success a young man may fancy, but to be laying there knowing that you had never even really tried for that Brass Ring.
What kind of a life would that be like to reflect back on? One that you hadn't even tried? Well, I'm going to say that because you are reading this blog, you probably have tried, or are trying.
Good for you.
And I am going to go further out on a limb and assume you are in an MLM, Network Marketing, Online Marketing, what ever business...
good for you, again.
I know, the same way you do, that no matter what business you are in, this Network Marketing model is the vehicle to get you to where you want to go.
We have the vehicle to make those dreams come true, a homebased MLM business.
The only problem is all those folks who it seems you have to drag, kicking and screaming into your MLM business in between suffering "fools" being impolite on the phone, and thinking they are superior to you, and snickering at, and laughing at, and demeaning your dream.
And it gets easy to say, I'll reshuffle my list, I'll redo my web page, I'll try something new...
tomorrow.
On a regular basis I put myself back into that last hospital bed and ask myself, "What are you saying to yourself?" Knowing what you have in your hands, can you imagine the feeling you would have, lying there, reflecting back, thinking about that one call that rattled you so you refiled your files to clear your head (you have one that you are thinking about right now).
Think about that empty feeling lying there in that bed...
was being afraid to stick your hand out to that sharp couple, manning (or womaning) up to ask the one person you are petrified to invite to a meeting, being a little tired the next day to stay up late and get that blog or article written and submitted, worth that feeling of regret? Shame? Waste? Would it seem so trifling as to be absurd? You bet.
So stick your hand out, call that prospect, write that blog.
You have it in you to make that last look back a torrential down pour of Brass Rings.