Recently I was speaking at a conference, and someone came up to me afterwards and asked how she could grow her business and still be a great mother; she said she just didn’t have enough time. Great question, I get it a lot from parents. I’ve tackled this in my own life, because I want a great business but not at the expense of my family who are more important to me than any business ever could be.

So I asked her who does the cleaning, shopping, cooking, gardening etc. at her house. Her answer was like most people’s; she and her husband did it all.

I think it’s important to see the true cost of things in your life; the opportunity cost.

A paucity mentality makes us hold on to anything we can do to save a few pennies here and there, but what’s the true cost of that?

• Failure to grow your business and make real money (you don’t save your way to riches)
• Failure to spend quality time with your family
• Failure to enjoy life

Money can buy happiness, when you use it to pay people to do the things you don’t like doing. (We have just built a house with 10 acres of land, and I didn’t buy a mower! I love it; looking out over vast amounts of grass, feeling the sense of peace that living in the country offers, because I can’t do the lawns. Otherwise I’d likely look at them as my weekend sentence.)

When you are a business owner you directly influence your personal income; do a better job and you make more. I think an abundance mentality is what’s required to do the things where you add the most value, and share the wealth by paying others to do the things that allow you to thrive.

It makes all the difference.