Digital Launch Issue
Encourage • Equip • Inspire • Ignite
BREAK THROUGH to the next level Pushing the Boundaries of Limitation
April/MAY 2014 ISSUE 23
Are you doing busyness or
business?
IT'S ALL Let Go. Grab On. Share ABOUT Big Trapeze Moments in Business
FOCUS
Are you winning in business?
Discover 3 successful strategies for your business. juicedstrategies.com
Discovering Purpose, Shifting Culture
CONTENTS FEATURES 10 14
Be Leave Let Go. Grab On. Share
Big Trapeze Moments in Business
19 22
Breaking through to the next level Called from comfort
Breaking through the boundaries of limitation
26 28
It's all about focus Are you doing busyness or business?
IN EVERY ISSUE 4 6
Editor's welcome This month's contributors
PRODUCTS & SERVICES
2 5 8 9
Business strategies Business book launch Business networking Business insurance, online admin services Corporate gifts, short term insurance, family church, travel agent, estate agent, business services, health consultant, labour consulting, electrical contractor Social networker Staff development
16 18 21
Funeral services, networking systems, IT solutions, master jeweller, educational psychologist
24 Cleaning services, graphic designer, travel agent, copy writing 31 KB Connect magazine is produced by: Tracey Olivier Editor tracey@connectmagazine.co.za Elaine Young Sub-Editor elaine@copyeditpaste.co.za Ruth Brophy Art Director ruth@housebrophy.co.za Advertising Sales: 084 548 4720 • sales@connectmagazine.co.za www.kbnconnect.co.za | 3
Editor's Welcome
I
t always amazes me how the theme of each issue of Connect seems to be handpicked by God. Even though it is chosen well in advance of the production of the magazine, each time I seem to go through exactly what the theme represents in my personal life. Which brings me to reveal – ta-da – exactly what this issue is all about: Breakthrough. Although we all love the sound of the word “breakthrough” and often long for it, the actual experience of “breaking through” can be a little unpleasant. Think about it! Breaking through any kind of barrier normally means facing some fears head-on, and then choosing to push forward to the other side. It is especially hard when you aren’t really cooperating with the Lord, because sometimes your breakthrough comes in a form you were not expecting. My encouragement to you is to surrender to the One whom you can trust. Father God is for you and not against you. Change is never easy, but always necessary if you want growth. You can do this! At the beginning of this year I had three pictures which I shared in a letter to our KB Networking group. The first was a catapult; the next was a tree; and the third was a jet plane breaking the sound barrier. I have written an article about the tree which you can read in this issue, and the other two pictures I’ll share with you here. I hope that they encourage you.
The catapult:
There are those of you who are feeling frustrated. You know you are in the right place, doing the right thing, but you feel like you have gone backwards and you are stuck. If you are feeling as if everything you 4 | www.kbnconnect.co.za
have worked for seems to have taken a huge step backwards, I would like to encourage you to hold on. Imagine a picture of Father God, His eye firmly on the target, pulling us back in a huge catapult and drawing us into His chest. In the natural it may seem like we have lost ground and that things are not working. But while we are against His warm chest he loves on us and we are covered in the molten liquid gold of His love. Then he releases some of us, and as we land, the liquid gold (His love) splatters those around us and they are impacted by His love. Some of us are not released yet, and when we ask why, Father God tells us to look at our hands. When we do, we see that we are holding chains that are bolted into the ground. He gently says, “I cannot release you until you let those chains go”. These are not things that hold us, but things we choose to hold onto. They might be unforgiveness, offences, positions or products even, that we know we need to let go of. These things will hold us down and not allow us to reach the height and distances we need to go to fulfill our destiny and calling. The key to moving forward lies on our letting go of them.
Breaking the sound barrier:
Many years ago when Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier, it was a huge event. It had never been done before, and many had died trying it. The shaking of the aircraft before it broke through would be frightening, and bits of the aircraft would break off. Unlike all the others who had gone before him, Yeager pushed through and held on until that crack through the atmosphere when he broke into a smooth, supersonic ride.
If there is a whole lot of shaking going on right now in your business, you aren’t the only one. Look at the things that are taking strain. Times are changing and you can’t do business the way you have always done. We are in a new season and we need to realign ourselves with what God is doing. It is time to break your sound barrier; time to go where you haven’t gone before; time to arise and shine. Don’t stop until the shaking stops, no matter what.
Kingdom Business Networking, Equip and Connect are:
Every single one of the articles in this issue has encouraged, inspired and ignited me and I trust they will do the same for you. Remember to share, share, share. And please stay in touch with us – the blessing is complete when we hear what God has done in your lives through Connect.
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This Issue's Contributors Tracy Swift New Zealand A self-confessed “peopleholic” and “change champion”, Tracey is the owner of New Identity Ltd. Her company’s purpose is to liberate and love people who are orphaned in life and business, enabling them to harness the right tools to acquire a ‘voice’ in the marketplace. As founder of Arise Shine New Zealand, she also has a passion to see women rise up in every sphere of life and become the ‘significant influencers’ they were called to be. Chuck Blakeman Denver, Colorado US Chuck Blakeman works with business founders and leaders around the world to help them make more money in less time and get back to the passion that brought them into business in the first place, so they can build a mature business in support of their Lifetime Goals. Ed Ramsami Gauteng, South Africa Ed is the founder of SHIFT, a company that specialises in helping companies, churches and individuals to shift from their current reality to a vibrant, effective and productive future reality.
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Nicole Potgieter, Netherlands Nicole is wife to Kobus and mom to two "wild at heart" boys who dream big and talk a lot. She is an un-religious lover of Jesus, who sets her heart free daily with His unconditional and intoxicating love, goodness and grace. Doug Lichtwark East Asia Doug and his wife Kalinda run iBringFreedom, a ministry that is dedicated to reaching, rescuing and restoring those trafficked and trapped in Asia’s sex trade. They work practically to reach out to those held captive and bring the deliverance and healing that Jesus Christ promised. An ordained Pastor, Doug is a powerful speaker with a passion for the local church and training leaders with a vision for the expansion of the Kingdom of God. Visit www.ibringfreedom.org. Tracey Olivier Durban, South Africa Tracey is a warrior princess in a home of strong men (her husband Gary and three sons). She has a lot of awesome friends, but thats no surprise - Awesome attracts Awesome! She is a life coach, motivational speaker and her passion for Christians in business results in the little gem of a magazine that you are reading now. Follow her blog here for more business insight from a christian perspective.
www.kbnconnect.co.za | 6
BOOK REVIEW What distinguishes you as a follower of Christ in the marketplace? Living out kingdom principles and displaying godly character are minimum standards, but there has to be more than just working hard and harvesting the fruits of your labour. God is not limited to a pulpit, but where is the tangible evidence of a supernatural God with you every day in your business? God With You at Work will validate you in your calling as a businessperson. It will launch you into a whole new realm of experiencing more from a partnership with God in your daily activity. Andy’s personal journey and the stories from other real-life business people will shatter your ‘normal’ and become your stepping stone to access greater things. The tangible Presence of God is the distinguishing factor that causes
you to stand out. It’s not compulsory, but it is an invitation. Do you want it? I had the privilege of reading Andy’s book, God with you at work before it was launched. This incredible book will encourage and inspire you to invite God into your business in a real way. It will ignite you to open your eyes to the many opportunities where God would like to make Himself known to those you serve in life and business. I highly recommend this book. To find out more and to get the book click here.
When you have come too far to turn back, it is then that you can hit a level of chaos that is profoundly disorienting, and your heart will cry for a way out. However, there comes the awareness that a way out is not even an option because you are in that proverbial nowhere zone between a former somewhere and a new “not-there-yet”. Silence your fears, and honour that small voice which says, “The only way out is through!” - Dr. Mark Chironna
www.kbnconnect.co.za | 7
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I
t’s a weird saying: “expect the unexpected”. After all, something is called unexpected because you don’t expect it...right? Whoever thought of this saying may have a few more notches on their belt of life than me. 2013 was a roller coaster ride. No sooner had I left the safety of the station with all the exhilaration and exuberance of what was to come, than I found myself thrust into the high highs and low lows of navigating my own business. It’s funny how we yearn for adventure and the wide open spaces of no limitations or restrictions...and then suddenly find ourselves longing for the predictable and safe. In order to grow we have to take risks. risk r'sk/ noun plural noun: risks 1. a situation involving exposure to danger
Yikes, danger! Really? It’s true...whilst we regularly encourage each other to pursue our dreams, to follow our passions, we very rarely end this advice with the following disclaimer: WARNING – Taking risks will expose you to danger! Danger of losing your friends, family, finances and even faith. In birthing a business this year I had positioned myself for change, or so I thought. God had clearly said to me at the start, “Do not limit this venture by putting yourself in a box (homing in on any one specific service or
10 | www.kbnconnect.co.za
service delivery) but keep what you do wide open”. Wow, I thought as I wrote His words down, that’s a great idea. As business opportunities opened up I began to pursue them wholeheartedly, tailoring my services to meet clients’ needs. What a thrill it was to build something new with each client and have great fun doing it. Before I knew it, I had adopted some “thinking” that had me searching for the safe and predictable. Now it’s true, when you do find a groove or a formula that works in business it sometimes pays to capitalise on this where you see a definite gap in the market. But for me, my blueprint was different. On my return from a visit to South Africa in July, I knew that I had not been true to what I had set out to do. I felt deep within me that the ‘landscape’ had changed and I would have to find the courage to push the ‘reset’ button. Fear gripped me. I suddenly had no idea of what to do next. Two fair sized contracts I had in my pipeline were suddenly withdrawn for budgetary reasons. I now had three options: continue to pursue new opportunities with the old formula, press the ‘reset’ button to build the new, or run and hide! Realising that I had to start over again required a huge change of tack that just about took me out. For a very long time I could not see a way forward. I knew that the ingredients I had to add to my business meant I had to invest in myself. I would need to pursue further education and specific work experience to roll out a business that could offer the services I was so passionate about. In changing tack, I found myself in the doldrums. Yep, many sailors will tell you it’s a frustrating place. No wind means no movement. Just quiet contemplation! Everyone knows that if you’re not in the right head space, quiet contemplation can lead to a deep cave of doubt, disillusionment and depression. I quickly discovered that. In the absence of a definitive vision or the perceptible presence of God, I really began to struggle. Feelings of overwhelming failure gripped my heart as I tried to find a way forward. How could I have let myself get to this place? How could I let my family down? Where are you God? Do you still care? Then one day God said, “Go up to your mountain”. We have a place, God and I. It’s the most beautiful peninsula overlooking our city and islands. This is the place where God has often filled me with hope and more importantly just wrapped His arms around me and assured me of His love. I was really feeling broken inside so I took my journal and Bible and set off. I parked my car, got out and sat on the grass. As I was taking in the aweinspiring view, God began to speak.
God: “What do you see?” Me: “I see Rangitoto (one of our youngest volcanoes) and the islands, the landscape has not changed.” God: “So it is with me.” Me: “Wow it’s true, you are the same yesterday, today and tomorrow, which means your thoughts towards me are loving and good!” God: “What else do you see?” Me: “I see the birds flying, but they are not flapping, just drifting on the thermals.” God: “In me there is rest. In me there is no striving. What else do you see?” At that moment a tiny seed, carried on the wind by its fine, fluffy parachute, landed on my hand. Me: “I see a seed.” God: “So it is that you sow seed, but I water the seed. You do not control where the seed goes or if it grows, I do. Keep sowing seed in faith and BE... LIEVE.” Me: “BE..... LIEVE?” God: “BE and LEAVE! Be still, just be, then leave it up to me.”
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I went home different that day, and felt like I could fly. Heaviness had lifted and I knew that I had begun to have faith again.
Everything started with faith
Ephesians 2:8 says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith— and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God”. Everything began when we first BELIEVED! Within two days amazing opportunities opened up and I was ready to trust my precious Daddy again with this incredible journey called Life. So no matter how crazy your circumstances may be right now, no matter how far away you may feel from living your dream, walking in your destiny, or from God Himself, know one thing...God has not moved one inch! Everything in you and around you is working together for good if you just believe! Leave it in His hands. Sow seeds of faith, and keep believing. You have no control over where the seeds land or if they will germinate... but sow them anyway and LEAVE the rest up to God. Thank you GOD for staying close and encouraging me to BELIEVE! !
Tracy Swift New Zealand
www.kbnconnect.co.za | 13
Let go. Grab On. Share
Big Trapeze Moments in Business
S
ometimes the only route to the next level is to let go of something you are hanging on to. Progress requires risk, yet sometimes the pain we know seems better than the pain we have yet to experience. So we just stay put (stuck). But there are a few key trapeze moments you need to embrace, and only one that will help you build a real business.
Trapeze Moment #1
Deciding to go for it. Sometimes it’s not really a trapeze moment, but an “entrepreneurial spasm” because you’re sick of the man. But sometimes it’s truly a trapeze moment, making the decision to let go of a good thing to create one you think will be even better. Welcome to owning a new business!
Trapeze Moment #2
Deciding to take money or go it alone. Always, always, always go it alone if you can. GROW into business (use revenue to build it), don’t GO into business (using outside cash). All the stats show that businesses started with your own money have a MUCH bigger chance of success. If you need money, take it from anywhere but a venture capitalist, whose only objective is to eat your business alive and spit it out three years later for cash. 14 | www.kbnconnect.co.za
Trapeze Moment #3 – The Big One
Hiring your first Stakeholder (employee in Industrial Age companies). Everyone who starts a business will take the leap on the first two trapeze moments. But this is the one that decides whether you are creating a company, or just an income; whether you will get off a treadmill, or are building one. There are 28+ million businesses in America. 22+ million of them have no Stakeholders (employees). My guess is at least 15 million of the non-employer business owners cling tenaciously to the trapeze of “nobody is as good, committed, knowledgeable, experienced or caring as I am”. As a result, they will never own a company. At best they will own a job, and almost always that job pays less per hour than when they worked for the man. They are hostages to their business and will never get off the treadmill. Just about any successful business owner will tell you the scariest thing they did early on was hire their first Stakeholder. They will also all tell you it was the best move they ever made and should have done it sooner. With rare exception, you’ll never have enough money to hire your first person. Hiring them is what will make you that money. In today’s Participation Age world, there is no excuse for not taking the leap to hiring. In
his book, Virtual Freedom, Chris Ducker shows that you can start your business with Virtual Assistants, almost eliminating the traditional risk of hiring. He emphasises figuring out what you 1) Don’t like doing, 2) Can’t do, and 3) Shouldn’t be doing (even if you like it and are good at it), and then finding VAs who can do those things. The hardest one for most of us is 3) Shouldn’t be doing. Those are the things we’re great at, love doing, are more experienced at than anyone else, etc. But they’re also almost always the things that
keep us from doing the one thing that will push our business forward. Are you facing a trapeze moment right now? If you are, here’s a great question – “What would I be doing right now if I wasn’t (doing tasks, afraid, ignoring the need for hiring, etc.)? Take the leap. ! Chuck Blakeman Denver, Colorado US Used with his permission.
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Breaking through
to the next level
The beginning of a new year always fills me with great hope and a sense of excitement. This year more than ever, I really sense that God is about to promote people to their next level of authority, influence and power. But to get there and experience this promotion, I believe that many of us need to realise a breakthrough in some form or another. There are far too many men and women – leaders in business, church, education and the community – who are stuck in the grip of fear and failure, and are facing giant-size foes of various kinds. Before you step into the next level God has
for you, you will have to face your Goliath head on and take it down. Your next level will not come without a fight. Understand this about your giant: it will speak to you. It will try to intimidate, limit and restrain you from possessing what is yours in God. It will speak words like, “Who do you think you are? You think God has a destiny for you? You think God will ever use you?” It will taunt you with words like, “You are nothing. Just give up and quit.” The words you hear will be in relation to the area of battle you are facing; the area where you need to experience the biggest breakthrough. www.kbnconnect.co.za | 19
For centuries if not millennia, people have been using the story of David and Goliath to encourage, inspire and motivate each other – especially the underdog, the weaker one who is really afraid to face up to whatever giant is currently taunting him/her and preventing a breakthrough. It is a great story filled with elements that Hollywood has been using for years. The younger, inexperienced hero who steps up to challenge the giant. A giant who has terrified hardened, seasoned warriors and made them into insignificant little weaklings who are afraid to step near the battlefield lest the giant confront them. But confront them Goliath does, shouting obscenities against them and their God. In steps David, a young Hebrew shepherd boy sent by his father to deliver refreshments to his older brothers in the terror-stricken Israelite army. 1 Samuel 17:23-26 tells us that “As they talked, behold, Goliath, the champion, the Philistine of Gath, came forth from the Philistine ranks and spoke the same words as before, and David heard him. And all the men of Israel, when
20 | www.kbnconnect.co.za
they saw the man, fled from him, terrified. And the Israelites said, ‘Have you seen this man who has come out? Surely he has come out to defy Israel; and the man who kills him the king will enrich with great riches, and will give him his daughter and make his father’s house free [from taxes and service] in Israel.’ And David said to the men standing by him, ‘What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?’” Before you experience your breakthrough you must walk through a place of contention. You must contend with your giant and gain victory over it before the anointing is released to manifest in a greater measure of authority. God anointed what was tested in David’s life. God anointed David’s sling shot, not Saul’s armour. David couldn’t win the battle in Saul’s armour because it hadn’t been tested in his life. David had wrestled the lion and the bear, and he had used his sling and stone out in the wilderness. God
anointed what had been tested. In the same way, God anoints what’s been tested in your life. Breakthrough will come out of your testings and battles. Smaller battles will make you skilful in winning larger battles. So celebrate, because the areas of your greatest testings are about to become the areas of your greatest anointing! The very assignments the adversary had against your life are about to be turned around against him. God is going to release the deepest anointing and glory where you have had the deepest level of warfare and contention. We are in a time where many are facing their Goliaths. They are in a time of spiritual pressure and resistance. What they do in this battle will determine their next season. Either they will sustain what God has given them and experience an
increase, or they could lose what has been entrusted to them. Usually the greatest fight is right before the greatest breakthrough. This is usually when people give up. They are right on the edge of moving to the next level when they get weary and tired. As long as you refuse to give up, God will make sure you attain your next level of inheritance. So be happy when you see spiritual contention in your life: it means you are on the verge of breakthrough and promotion. But we have to make the right choices and pray through to victory. !
Ed Ramsami Gauteng, South Africa
Equipping People for success with
INSPIRATION • SKILLS • TEAM BUILDING Staff Know how to do their work who: (Skills Development)
Work well with colleagues (Team Building)
More Productive Staff
Are inspired to give their best (Inspirational Speaking)
More Productive Company
company success
TIME TO STOP: We often fill our lives with so much busyness and so many unnecessary things that we miss the important ones. We fill our work time with e-mails, meetings and business things that we don't really need to be involved with. We clutter our personal lives with other things that just don't need to be done, thriving on the feeling of busyness...but leaving no time to find that peaceful place where we can see what's really going on around us. Just like a beautiful rose in bloom, or a stunning sunset that lasts only a few moments, we miss out on truly meaningful experiences because we are so preoccupied with staying on top of things. Ironic, isn’t it? Look at your life today, business-wise and personally. Are there things that you're doing that you shouldn't really be doing? Are there things that are just cluttering your life and creating more busyness and stress than you actually need? De-clutter your life. Streamline today so that you can enjoy the wonderful things around you and celebrate life.
Called from
Breaking through the boundaries of limitation
Comfort
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E
xactly one year ago I found myself in a place where I had no personal vision and had lost sight of the hope attached to my many dreams. With two days to go until another birthday, I was torn inside as I knew that there was more to life than what I was experiencing. Romans 8:15–17 in the Message version reads, “This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike ‘What’s next, Papa?’ God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what’s coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we’re certainly going to go through the good times with him!” In recovering from the hard times, I had slipped into a place where it felt like I was just existing rather than living. In an effort to pull myself out of this place, I did a very child-like thing. I grabbed a sheet of paper and some magazines and started to create a 'Dream/ Vision Board'. At the time what I was cutting out and pasting did not make sense. The end result was spectacular. I had managed to formulate a vision for myself that was inspired with new dreams and filled with fresh hope, something that I could run with. 2013 started up and as each month swiftly passed, I would tick off things on my Vision Board and I started to see life come to the paper. Towards the end of the year, there were just two things left: the word “ADVENTURE” and the phrase “A NEW WAY OF WORK”. In November my husband was offered a job opportunity that would entail us and our two young boys relocating to the Netherlands. Excitement and fear gripped me at the same time. As I started to manage the fears, the positives of this career move started to emerge. This move would crack open the world of “adventure” and show us “a new way of work”.
For me to embrace this courageous move, I had to respond to a call. I knew that it was time to step outside my comfort zone. I read an anonymous quote that said, “A comfort zone is a beautiful place, but nothing ever grows there”. For me to experience the fullness of my purpose in life, I needed to leave a place that made me feel secure, comfortable and in control. Moving out of a comfort zone is a proactive process. It is learning to do things differently. It requires one to think out of the box, to create new strategies and interventions. Two weeks into life in a new land, my outlook on life has started to change. I have seen the mental boundaries I placed on myself (the things I thought I could and couldn’t do) being torn down. To break into the new, you need to face your fears and embrace what is making you nervous. One thing I learnt in 2013 was that “you are the creator of your own story”. Believing in yourself is not an announcement of arrogance, it is a statement of strength. The year 2014 has the ability to be the year that you break through the boundaries of comfort and see success. For it is outside the place of comfort where growth, development, learning and change take place. When you are in it, you can see that there is a whole new world of possibilities out there. As the lyrics of a song by Jesus Culture go, “it’s gonna be wild, it’s gonna be great, it’s gonna be full of Me”. Go to the following link for a brilliant story picture of how to leave your comfort zone: http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=HhFxQlDPjaY. !
Nicole Potgieter, Netherlands www.kbnconnect.co.za | 23
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L
ife is fraught with challenges, opposition and difficulties; very few of us sail through it without encountering storms, heavy seas or adverse winds at times. What does it take to push through these and make a significant advance in our field of endeavour? What does it take to overcome difficulties and opposition in our businesses and homes? I have noticed that breakthrough is not necessarily won by the fast, the gifted, the beautiful or the super intelligent. I personally have seen many of these kinds of people run their lives onto a reef! The people who achieve breakthrough are people with discipline and focus who simply will not give in. Focus in life is more than devotion to the success of our business. I heard recently of a friend who has achieved outstanding financial success in his business, yet in the process has lost his sense of moral direction by cutting ethical and legal corners. Surely any breakthrough at the expense of our integrity is simply fool’s gold! In true breakthrough, we advance in life with our faith and integrity intact. What I have seen modelled in the lives of truly successful people around me, I have also seen modelled through the biblical account of King David. I have often wondered about King David and how he managed to overcome the rejection of those closest to him, along with so many other incredible hardships. Remember, David was a real living, breathing human being, just the same as you and I. He was not some kind of super species. In reading the Psalms we find keys to David’s thoughts, prayers and faith. Psalm 27 is particularly pertinent to us. In verse 3 he says, “Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident”. These were no casual, metaphorical words; they were real to David’s life and experience. Enemy armies had indeed set up camp around him, and a madman had pursued him through a wilderness for years on end with the intent of killing him. Maybe that feels like your life right now, with cares and troubles mounting up around you and threatening to overwhelm you. Look at David’s response under extreme
pressure: “One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple” (verse 4). It seems so counter-intuitive that, in the midst of such opposition and difficulty, the “one thing” David asked of the Lord was to dwell in His house and to gaze upon His beauty! For most of us, the “one thing” we would be asking of the Lord would be to “kill the enemy for me please Jesus!” A great temptation for us all is to look to the Lord for an ‘easy out’, an escape, rather than fixing our eyes on Him and drawing on His strength to face and walk through our difficulties. Maybe this is the key to David’s greatness: not in asking for the problem to go away but the courage to keep his eyes on the Lord in the midst of it. In so doing, David did not withdraw from adverse circumstances, but gained in strength and wisdom by facing and walking through them with his eyes focused on the Lord. When there are so many things to do, so many troubles to fix, so many fires to fight, it is easy for our eyes to turn to the issues at hand and lose their focus on the One who loved us, gave His life for us and holds the answer to our breakthrough. Friend let me ask you: upon what are your eyes gazing? Whatever it takes for you to lift your eyes from your circumstances and get them fixed on Christ, do it. For me I have found the most useful way to lift my focus is through worship. I am no musician – I know that no one will ever ask me to sing in the choir – but God has given me a voice so I will use it! As we worship Him, His grace fills us, faith is reawakened and our hearts take hold of courage to face the challenges of advancing our lives and businesses. !
Doug Lichtwark East Asia www.kbnconnect.co.za | 27
Are you doing busyness or
business?
H
ave you ever looked at a business person and thought, “Wow look at how busy they are; they must be incredibly successful”? Busyness can often be mistaken for productivity. This is something I realised a few months ago in my business. I was so busy that I was bursting at the seams, and people were commenting about how my business was growing at a rate of knots. When they did, I would smile and play along – while inside I was thinking, “So why isn't my bank balance growing?” This is the danger we as small business owners face. We create the sparkle and the press (which are important to get the name of our brand out there) and everyone loves us because inevitably we give away lots of our time and resources in this phase. The problem is that we start to believe our own press and we are seduced into believing that the busyness means we are growing our business.
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I was on holiday in Australia when I had the time and head space to listen to the nagging little warning bell that was going off in the background. With all the noise gone, that quiet little warning bell became a reality check. Why, if there seemed to be so much growth on the surface, was my bank balance not only not growing, but slowly getting worse?
For the first time I took the rose-tinted glasses off and looked at my business with fresh eyes. Suddenly it was glaringly obvious: if I carried on doing the same thing, I would continue to get the same results – and I didn't like where that was going.
I realised two things:
1
My business was like a tree that was full of leaves but no fruit. My ‘busyness’ was creating exposure, but in my case my efforts were yielding little fruit. At first glance it looked like it was flourishing, but there would be no new growth once the cycle was over. This was clearly unsustainable. I had to prune this tree, and quickly.
2
I was giving of my root and not my fruit. I am incredibly passionate about small business and because of that
I was pouring myself out without getting any monetary value in return. Now there is nothing wrong with this, but there is a wiser way to do it. I should have built the business first, ensured it was strong and flourishing, and then from the fruit fed those I am passionate about. This way I would be sustainable and able to support and undergird others without putting my business in jeopardy.
My advice to you is:
1 Pause
Take some time out. For at least a day, go somewhere that is totally outside of your work realm.
2 Be honest 3 Pruning 4 Start doing
Face the facts. What are you doing that is busy but not fruitful? My next step was to make a choice and make the change. I didn't even know how I was going to do that…but I’ve discovered that once you make the decision to change, life (God) has a way of helping you. When I got back to South Africa, some things shifted, which confirmed the decision to change. I then started the process of change, which is a whole other article.... So what can you take from this article? Despite the sparkle and press, the Facebook posts and the perception of others that your business is flourishing, is your bank balance – or your gut – saying otherwise?
Make the adjustment; it might even mean stopping something. Add the nutrients. Are there some things you need to do to enhance the growth of your business?
5 Check your root
Have you given too much? You will need to take time to let that part heal and grow again. ! Tracey Olivier Durban, South Africa
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