I recently spoke with a small business owner who after 17 years in business, and having built a special requirement building that carried a $20,000 per month mortgage obligation, and was sized to accommodate his needs when doing 5 million annually, and now he is doing 1 million and gagging, choking, paying the note, but focused, committed and figuring out how he can get through another month, not for one second considering the fact that the numbers do not add up.

I asked him his profit margins and after discussing this for a few moments he agreed it was about 20-25% (on a good day)  so really in dollars his gross profit was approximately  $250,000 maybe  $300,000 if we want to kid ourselves. I then asked him his annual mortgage cost…easy arithmetic, $240,000 not counting insurance, taxes, maintenance.

There was stunned silence for a long time. The man just got it. He was walking dead and had not acknowledged it to himself.

After allowing this to sink in, I asked him if he could ‘move down the street and rent, maybe not so terrific a building but at $5000 rent, per month or maybe even $7500. he could save $150,000 per year and maybe even take a pay check home every now and then.

But my building he muttered, as if it was his child. He was emotionally crushed feeling totally defeated. We have all been there and understand this feeling, an empty sinking feeling in your gut, almost ready to throw up. The sudden realization you have failed. Your mission has failed.

But alas, I congratulated him on seeing reality as many business owners at this point simply disagree and rush me off the phone, not even wanting to consider such insane thoughts, but he got it.

My next statement was “nice work, you see the issue, now lets talk about how we turn this problem around and create success again, we can do it.”

So we did. The man is out scouring the community looking for a place to rent…..he is ready to succeed again, and walking away from his building mentally and spiritually is the first step. He succeeded e made this leap, all within a one hour telephone call. It can be done.

Deep inside, we all know the truth. We simply allow ourselves to ignore it and go about doing what we think we should be doing to survive, never once thinking if we actually should survive, at least in the same format and with the same business plan.

One of two things happen when that deep truth is stirred, either rejection, the usual response, or  clarity followed by the sudden feeling of emptiness and nausea, quickly buried in a ‘can do anything’ attitude, the hallmark of a committed entrepreneur. That works most of the time but when it is about the basic issue of survival, the entrepreneur digs in and fights harder, never considering giving up, knowing he is wrong, but choosing to act in the only way he knows…fighting until they drag his cold corpse out the back door.

This man wants to survive, and he has seen the real issue and now must decide if he is going to do something about it, or put the truth away and believe his own lies…that he can make it, if he only works harder.

Not so, my friends, unfortunately, not so. You must work smarter as you are already working as hard as you can…there must be a better plan. We have it.