“What would you attempt to do if you knew you would not fail?” ~ Robert Schuller ~

I love this saying, but it wasn’t until the other day that it really brought it’s true meaning to light for me. As business owners, we often worry about taking a chance and going out on a limb. We worry about the repercussions of trying a new service, changing our target market or trying a new marketing idea. However, the majority of those with truly successful businesses are the ones that believe that failure is not an option.

I recently attended FoVA (Forum on Virtual Assistance) and when there I was surrounded with Virtual Assistants, both new and veteran, as well as aspiring VAs. Many of these VAs were all leaving with new ideas that they couldn’t wait to implement into their businesses, however I wondered how many actually would “put their money where their mouth was”, so to speak, and actually follow through on those plans that day.

We often times get these great ideas in our heads and then we do nothing to follow through and implement these ideas. We become complacent with the way that things are going and never think about “stirring things up” and taking a “leap of faith”.

So this brings me back to the quotation that I shared with you. Fear can be a very powerful force if you let it. It can stop you from achieving great things. So this is my vow for my business in 2008 … I will not accept failure as an option and I will not let fear stop me from moving forward. This year I am going to take those leaps of faith. I am going to be willing to try new things and to be open and honest and more importantly when something is not working I am going to figure out how to make it work before I accept failure.