I’m an entrepreneur. Or am I?

This is what has been bugging me for a few weeks, and even more so since my birthday just whooshed by yesterday.

I have been working ( a lot) as the restaurant manager for a small hotel here in NH and, while it is rewarding and fun and all of that, I miss the freelancing and excitement of my own biz.

I spent some time yesterday working on brainstorming and planning and goal-setting for 2010, and came to the conclusion that I am going to have to be very focused and extremely diligent if I am going to accomplish the things that I want to do while working around the full-time-job thing.

In fact, I am a full month behind where I should be in terms of updating some of my products for 2010. While I can write part of that off to being sick for 4 weeks in Oct/Nov, a big part of it is that I simply have not been at my desk. The state of my in-box can attest to that! I linked to a post about creating a fixed schedule for yourself in order to balance work and non-work last week, but this solution is just not going to work for me – I can’t create a fixed schedule for the restaurant. So this is going to take some more thinking, with these concepts as guidelines:

1. Time allows you to rest and recover – I particularly need downtime for recuperating from stress. Pushing myself and overcoming challenges are excellent ways to invest time, yet until I fully recover from the recent bout with illness, resting is the best way to use some of the time I gain from that investment.
2. Time allows you to increase your focus – With less time to work on the “important” projects that I do want to complete, it is vital that I focus tightly on them. And start less projects in order to accomplish/complete the ones that I do start.
3. Time allows you to see how things turn out – Having set this restaurant manager gig in motion I am identifying the variables that are beyond my control, and now waiting to determine their full effects is all I can do. I will work toward investing this downtime to prepare for the next stage of the progression.
4. Time allows you to create balance in your life – All work and no play leads to a heart attack, or GERD. I must remember to invest the time that I do have to be with/communicate with my family and friends. Connecting with your circle is energizing and something that I definitely do not do enough of. Hearing from people that I have not heard from in a long time was one of the best things to happen yesterday.

There it is. Part one of the thought-process. Part two will involve making some choices and breaking down the vital projects into Action Steps. The choices will be difficult, mainly because I have started/want to start too many things.

Because it is time to get back into that entrepreneurial mindset, applying it to my “job” and to the freelancing/personal projects. It is time stop deluding myself, hoping that these projects can languish and wait on the back burner until some point in the future where “more time” magically appears.

Because, like everything else in Pandora’s Box, hope is evil and destructive. [important note: I am not being a pessimist or taking the negative point of view, it's just that hope is not a viable strategy for accomplishing anything, and hope is distinct from positive thinking]

Do less to accomplish more is my new mantra.

Discipline and Focus are the watchwords.

I will keep you posted, can you help me stay on track with encouragement and gentle prodding? I think that Twitter will be the best place for that.

Chris Perrin and I had a discussion about how your Productivity practice is more like a marathon than a sprint. Since I am not much of a runner, never have been, it was interesting to hear how this perspective could be applied to workflow and goal-setting.

Part of good productivity then, is looking at life as a marathon and planning for a longer period of time.

There are several ways to do this:
1. Know what has to be done (and when): A marathon runner has to know her track. You have to know what needs to be accomplished so that can you have the proper
strategy.

2. Know where you want to be: You can have more than one goal for running a race. Some people run to win, some run to finish, some run for the exercise. Why are you running the race and where do you want to be at the end?

3. Know what is important: Again, part of the strategy aspect. What steps will get you where you want to be?

4. Don’t panic: Once you have an idea of what needs to be done, there is a tendency in many to say “Holy [favorite expletive], I’ve got a lot to do” and just start diving in. However, this is not always the best course of action. You have to keep your strategy in mind and not overwork youself in the beginning only to be exhausted later.

5. Sprint only when you have to: There are times when you are focred to sprint and other times when it makes sense to do so. However, this should be a strategic decision you make, not something you do as a matter of course.

6. Don’t be afraid to recover: After a good bout of sprinting, feel free to take time to recover. Trying to be productive for the long haul means and you may
need time to catch your breath.

7. Understand the REAL consequences: This sort of falls under the don’t panic rule and the strategic plannning. As you decide what to do and when to sprint, understand the real consequences of completing a task or leaving it unfinished. In some cases, you may WANT to have something finished, but the consequences of doing something else (or not doing it) may be too great. Be honest with yourself and know that most things can wait a few days or weeks to get finished while only a small handful cannot.

Download the podcast

[podcast]http://stephenpsmith.com/downloads/productivity-marathon-podcast.mp3[/podcast]

Christine Major sent out a reminder:

In case you need to be reminded, the Portsmouth TweetUp at the Gas Light Co. is tomorrow night starting at 6:30! Woo hoo!

I am really excited to see and meet everyone at what will be a great event.

The weather for tomorrow night at this time is still a bit iffy and I choose not to pay attention to any forecasts that say it is going to rain. But the event will happen rain or shine because The Gas Light has made arrangements for us to go to the upstairs club if we cannot go on the outdoor deck, but let’s not think about that. Think only dry thoughts.

Don’t forget that there will be pizza there provided by JitterGram and MicroArts. We have a limited amount of pizza that will be coming out througout the night so hopefully everyone will get some.

We will also be raffling off a $50 GC to Gas Light Co and another $50 gift card to Sullivan Tire. We also have several tour passes for New England Curiosities to raffle off while you are there and some t-shirts I have lying around my house that I am not wearing anymore (ok, maybe not that).

I will be handing out Pokens that were donated by @startpoken to the 5 winners who played along with me on Twitter the other night. http://www.startpoken.com/ – if you are interested in checking out a poken you can see me. I will let you play with my poken

I am looking forward to meeting everyone, and pushing (gently, of course) the Social Media Club – New Hampshire.

My friend Robert Hruzek has a guest post at the SOBCon blog:

[Note from the Proprietor: The basis for this post comes from an – well, let’s call it an “incident”, shall we? – that happened last year at SOBCon08 in Chicago. Unlike your typical episode of Dragnet, however, names have NOT been changed to protect the innocent because – hey, let’s face it – there ARE no innocents here!]

All right y’all; I have what is (or if it ain’t then it should be) the Question Of The Ages: Is there, in fact, a “wrong” way to eat pizza?

The reason the question comes up at all is because of a little-known incident that happened at last year’s SOBCon08.

Read more –>