When you decide to start your own business, you will find from that day forward, you always have more things to do than you have time in which to do them.
As a mom, you’re probably there already, whether you’ve taken the leap into entrepreneurship yet or not!
One of the biggest keys to being successful is figuring out where to spend your time, and which activities are a waste of time or won’t move your business forward at all.
As you are filling up the precious time slots in your day, you may be tempted to say you don’t have time to read books, even if reading is something you enjoy.
This would be a big mistake in your quest for entrepreneurial success.
While it may seem like a luxury, almost every successful entrepreneur will tell you that reading has been fundamental to their growth and development as an entrepreneur.
For this reason, they make it a daily habit.
Just to give you a couple of extreme examples, Bill Gates strives to read a book a week. Warren Buffett says that he spends much of his work day reading.
Maybe Bill and Warren are a few steps ahead of where you are today, or where you ever desire to be with your business, but if you’ll ask the more “regular” entrepreneurs you meet, the successful ones will almost always tell you that one of their essential daily habits is reading.
Don’t stop reading here, run out and buy a trashy romance novel, and call yourself a better entrepreneur.
First we’ve got to take a look at how and what you should be reading.
Developing a Reading Habit
Reading needs to become as automatic to you as brushing your teeth.
If you go in with the attitude of “I’ve got to make time to read,” you’ll end up with a bookshelf full of unread books.
We have time for what we make time for, and you’re going to have to schedule your time to read or you’ll never find it.
At first you may feel guilty, like you’re taking time away from the important things you need to do by spending your time reading.
Once you develop the habit and start to reap the benefits, you’ll realize reading is one of the important things.
Find what works for you, but a good habit is to make reading part of your morning routine.
Wake up, grab a glass of water, and spend as much time as you can buy yourself with a book. It’s worth waking up 30 minutes extra for.
Committing to reading at least two pages before you go to bed is also a good way to develop a reading habit.
If it’s only two pages, that’s a good start, but you’ll often find that starting with an intention to read two will turn into 20.
Reading is a good break in your hectic day too. Setting aside a little “me” time to read while the kids nap or right before they get home can give you something to look forward to and recharge you during an afternoon slump.
There is no right or wrong here, do what works for you. Just make sure you schedule this into your day because it’s definitely one of those things you’ll otherwise never get to.
How to Make Your Reading Count
You’ll hear some people boast about how they read 100 books in a year, thinking that makes them smarter than all the rest of us.
And it probably would if they actually absorbed what was in those books and acted on it. But the chances of that are slim unless they spend several hours a day reading.
The reading habit isn’t about taking a speed reading course and seeing how many books you can get through in a day, week, or year.
It’s about how much you can learn and apply from those books.
With most books, you’ll find that you take away one big idea, and the groundwork for how to implement it.
Rarely, you’ll stumble upon that book that changes your life.You’ll find yourself re-reading that book once a year or so, and using it as your business/life bible of sorts.
While it will certainly slow you down, you need to take notes as you read if you want to really get something out of a book.
You can do this either by actually typing or writing out notes as you come upon important lessons, or by underlining and writing things in the margins of the book, and then going back and making notes from your notes in the book.
As you read the book, or when you’ve finished, make a plan for how you’re going to implement what you’ve learned.
Knowledge is cool to have, but it gives you zero advantage if you don’t use it to move yourself ahead.
What to Read
The good news and the bad news is that there are an endless number of quality books out there that will help you from a business and personal development perspective.
So, where to start?
Well, you can approach this several different ways.
Googling “best books for entrepreneurs” will do the trick, and provide you with literally hundreds of recommendations.
Which may just overwhelm you and cause you to take a week picking out what book you want to start with. Not a good thing.
Going to the bookstore and browsing through the books, picking them up and reading the covers is actually a great way to find a book. Or maybe it’s more like letting a book find you.
Unfortunately, even when we do find time to leave the house and do something for ourselves, as moms it can be hard to get the uninterrupted hour away that this may take you. (But do keep this method in mind when you have some free time, it works great!)
To simplify the process of picking a book to start your reading habit, here’s a list of books that are particularly good for newer entrepreneurs.
And while they have nothing to do with being a mom, they’re also good for moms because they’ll help with some of the mindset and productivity issues that are especially relevant for the busy mom.
1. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. This is the book that is life-changing for many people. Because it was written in 1937, it does have some outdated language and concepts in it, but the lessons here are phenomenal. If you haven’t read this book, start here.
2. The Magic of Thinking Big by David J. Scwartz. This is another old one, published in 1959, but it contains a very inspiring and practical approach to how to achieve the life and business of your dreams.
3. The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. If you struggle to really put your creative self out there, this is the book for you. It deals with the resistance all entrepreneurs encounter and how to overcome it and move yourself forward.
4. Choose Yourself by James Altucher. The old path of college to a nice stable career is no longer a given, and is no longer what many people even want. In this book you’ll learn great lessons about how you can forge your own path to a successful business and life without relying on someone else to hire you.
5. Essentialism by Greg McKeown. This is an easy to read book with a great perspective and talks about something that we as moms often struggle with: focus. If you’re looking for lessons on how to make less into more, this is the book for you.
If you’re not sure where to start, don’t overthink it. You can’t go wrong starting with whichever of these five appeals most to you.
Important note on what to read.
Yes, you should always be reading a business-related book, but that is not all you should read.
Read things that interest you, including biographies and fiction.
You’ll learn subtle business and life lessons from biographies, and they’re just plain interesting.
With fiction, you’ll learn how to become a better writer, which is a skill every business owner needs.
Fiction books also provide you with that much-needed mental break in your day that ultimately helps you be more focused and productive.
Books As Your Mentor
Don’t underestimate the power of books when it comes to your business and personal development.
Apply the lessons you learn from the books you read and when someone eventually asks you who your most important mentors were on your road to success, you’ll find the authors of many books you’ve read popping into your mind.
Of course, personal mentorship is important too, which is why Kids Party Characters owner Cheryl Jacobs has decided to offer memberships to her business as a way of mentoring new or struggling entrepreneurs.
With a membership to KidsPartyCharacters.com, you get your own ready-made business, and Cheryl’s support and guidance to make that business successful.
Membership includes an exclusive territory in which to book parties, the right to use our 200 plus costumes, access to our acting coach and casting director, and business training from Cheryl and continuing support from her and the team at KidsPartyCharacters.com.
If you think you’re ready to start your own business, or are an entrepreneur looking for another income stream, set up a friendly, no-pressure chat with Cheryl right here and she’ll answer all your questions and help you figure out if KidsPartyCharacters.com is the right opportunity for you.
To see more about the magic we create at KidsPartyCharacters.com, be sure to connect with us on Facebook for daily updates.
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