Entrepreneurship for the Rest of Us

Chapter 9Getting Motivated and Staying Motivated for the Long Haul

Often, the biggest problem people have with achieving their goals is getting started. It seems that Sir Isaac Newton got it right with his first law of motion: bodies at rest tend to stay at rest. Many people just can't seem to get underway. They simply don't take action, and spend the rest of their lives talking about what might have been instead of what was.

So, what does it take to get started? One easy way is to have someone else light a fire under you—"If you don't do X, by such and such a time, you're fired"—or you light one under yourself—"I am not going to sleep tonight until I have taken a first step toward finding a new market for our product."

The problem with lighting ...