I got up today after not quite enough sleep and went to an appointment with an accountant at the Small Business Development Center downtown. I run a small business. I hear businesses like mine referred to as "micro-businesses" frequently. It is just me doing something I love and trying to meet expenses while still impacting the world positively.
I don't know exactly what made me schedule that appointment at the SBDC, but I remember the way I was feeling. One day last week I had had enough. I do an okay job with my accounting if I actually do it. But I don't. I don't have the information that I feel I need and so I wait for the day that I will have that information. Mind you, the needed information isn't rocket science. I have to understand how accounts work, how the money flow happens, and how that is translated into my accounting software's language. Mostly, I get it. I get it enough that I have managed to complete my accounting for all the years of my business. But there have always been a few of those puzzle pieces missing. And I needed to fill in the holes so I could stop kicking myself every time I saw the huge file labeled "QBs to enter" on my desk.
So, feeling a little like I was baring my soul and entering a relationship with a psychologist who would see all (and hopefully not tell), I brought my last profit and loss statement and my laptop to meet Andrea. Blessed relief, she was professional, vastly experienced, and extremely practical. Once I admitted that I needed help, the rest is easy (isn't that always the case?).
She had suggestions of things I can do. She explained how to do some of the first steps I need to take. And best of all, she gave me another appointment... and then one after that. What she handed me was empowerment. She said flat out, you are doing great. I think you can manage all of this and I think you can even do your own taxes. (Whoa there! not sure about that one.)
Enter Seth Godin. While eating lunch, I watched an interview with him in which he was talking about how we are so often wasting our time. He says the time to take action is today. Stop waiting for that perfect horse on the carousel to come around. There is no perfect time. There is only today. We make something out of where we are now and our individual talents and personality. There IS no perfect job or calling or place and waiting for it is a waste of time.
So wishing for my carousel horse to be a more financially stable business and my own personal bookkeeper is folly. I can create that, but I have to get on the merry-go-round first.
I'm off to my annual wellness visit with my internist. (When did this thing go from being called a physical to a "wellness visit". Isn't that just a way to box in the things I can ask her so the insurance company can charge for anything outside whatever "wellness" is?) Let's hope I can stay on that particular horse of health for another couple decades.
If you want to watch that Seth Godin interview with Marie Forleo, you can find it HERE.