The Seasons of Your Business

We’ve all been to the point where we feel like our business (and/or our life) is just not where we want it to be. You feel like your doing everything you should be doing but things just don’t seem to be going your way. Sometimes it may seem like the work that you are doing is actually doing more harm than good. Well, I can assure you that this is not the case. I can also assure you that you are not alone in feeling this way. Everybody who has ever become wealthy has faced a similar time during the course of their business. The key to overcoming this situation is to keep everything in perspective. Let me explain…

I was talking to my father yesterday and something he said (sorry, can’t remember exactly) caused me to remember a sermon he once preached at my church. As I started to think about the message of that sermon, I noticed that several factors in the text related directly to what we experience through entrepreneurship (stay with me I promise this is relevant). The text that he chose was from Ecclesiastes Ch. 3, which reads:

Ecc 3:1 To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to plant and a time to pluck up.
3:4 A time to break down and a time to build up;
3:6 A time to get, and a time to lose.
(So on and so Forth)

What does this mean to my business?

Well, what I learned from this text is that we are never really at a stand still; it just seems like we are. Most people will look at this text and conclude that there is a “time for every purpose”. But we should look at this text and take it a step further. Not only does every purpose have a season, every season has a purpose. There is never a time when we are not contributing to motion. Either we are moving ourselves forward or we are moving ourselves backwards, but we are making a contribution.

If we find that we are doing the work that is necessary for forward progress but have yet to see the fruit; it is probably just because we are expecting a harvest during the wrong season. We have to learn to continue to plow and sow and do the things that are necessary for growth with the understanding that a season for harvest is coming. The people who do this are able to one day realize the benefits of their labor while the other 95% will pack it up and quit having completed their work for naught.

Im sure you’ve heard this…

You will often hear successful entrepreneurs speak of the theory of “feast or famine”. Most of them will testify that their business ventures go from seasons of extreme debt to seasons of extreme wealth. Well, “feast or famine” is probably not the correct phrase to describe this situation. If they were to place things in proper perspective they would recognize that the “famine” season is nothing more than the season for “building or planting.” The “feasting season” is the season of reward.

If you keep up with professional athletics, you will know that most of them consider the “off-season” the most important time. It is not the season where they complete the activity that directly brings them money. But the off-season is the time when they put in all the blood, sweat, and tears to enable them to to produce during the season. So it is with us and our businesses. If we do not put the work in during our “off-season”, there will be no production during our “season”.

I say all that to say that if we learn to keep things in the proper perspective it makes it much easier to do what is necessary to accomplish our goals. We know that we will face adversity. We also know that building a business takes time. However, what we should remember is that for everything there is a season and that the season for harvest will come only to those who have endured the season for sowing. So stay faithful and dedicated because, just like on earth, there must come a change in the seasons.