Marc Guberti

Every time someone panics, they make more decisions faster. At the rate these people are doing it, they could be making important business decisions in a matter of seconds. When people are making that many important decisions in a quick amount of time, they are going to make some bad decisions. Action does need to be taken, but don’t go after the quantity of your actions instead of the quality of your actions.

Another result of panic is complete stagnancy. People stare at their project for almost an hour before doing any of the work. Bigger projects become smaller projects and smaller projects become unfinished products.

When panic consumes someone, they will be tempted to quit. Even the most successful entrepreneurs talk about how they were so close to quitting. You will achieve success gradually. There is no overnight shortcut. Not even Mark Zuckerberg was an overnight success although he became successful much earlier than the average entrepreneur.

So what causes panic? There are two major reasons that result in us panicking. You can easily see what caused someone to panic based on what they are doing now.

The first reason people panic is because they overthink. I think of what I will be doing in the future. I see myself with books, membership sites, CDs, and so on. Although I recommend doing a 5 year plan and writing your future goals down, thinking about them too much won’t get any work done. There is a difference between thinking about your success and taking action to turn your success into a reality.

The people that overthink are the ones who simply stare at their projects for a long period of time before actually working. Multiple thoughts come up such as how the project is going to be amazing and how that person will be able to charge a lot of money for the finished product. They will think of their blog getting thousands of visitors a day, but in reality, their blog is only getting 10 visitors a week. Action needs to be taken.

The second reason people panic is because of time. Time can be cruel because time goes fast or slow depending on the individual and what that individual is doing. If you are watching paint dry, you will be counting the seconds. If you are doing something pleasurable such as hanging out with friends, time flies by.

The problem occurs when it’s midnight and no work has been done. In order to compensate for lost time, this person will do their work from midnight until their body can’t stay awake any longer. Then they get up too early to compensate even more. By that time, the person is so tired that every business decision isn’t important anymore. The person is just too tired to identify how important business decisions are. They rush with their decisions and their work to catch up with where they should have been.

That’s how panic comes around, what panic can do, and what ultimately leads many entrepreneurs to quit.

The Bad: Something is wrong.

The Worse: Something is wrong and people know it.

The Ugly: Something is wrong, people know about it, and no action is being taken.

Polish your content so that none of it is bad. This prevents things from getting worse, and for some people, just getting ugly. Take action when you see a mistake, and don’t let a mistake stay up for long.

I created a blog post called “Everyone Notices Messinesss” (there is an extra s at the end of messiness). One of my friends looked at the title and told me, “You spelled that word wrong.”

Once my friend read the content, he realized the typo was intentional. People notice when something is wrong. We could have read 500 pages in a book and enjoyed every word. Then, on page 501, there is a typo that we stare at for a few seconds. Nevermind the 500 pages. What about page 501? Everyone notices the smallest mistakes.

A similar spell check can save a lot of frustration. Nothing needs to get bad, worse, or ugly.

Don’t fall into the shiny trap. The cars in the commercials are new and shiny. Most of them look better than the average person’s car. The average person’s car is going to have some dirt on it. You can’t avoid all of the puddles, rain drops, mud, and gravel when you are driving with your car. New becomes old very fast.

Remember when one of the car dealerships did a commercial for their newest car back in 2012 or even earlier? You may see the ones for 2013 and 2014. Remember those commercials, and then when 2015 comes, remember how shiny the cars from 2013 and 2014 looked. In 2015, there will probably be a car commercial for the 2016 car.

My Mac Book Pro was in the box when I got it. The keyboard was untouched and so was everything else. It’s not in horrible condition, but you can see that it has been used. I still use it every day, and I am still happy with the product. I don’t need to buy another computer until the one I am using breaks.

When we make choices to buy something, that something we buy will lose its shine. Make sure you can use it and you’re not just getting it because it’s popular, new, and shiny. Within a few years, what is popular, new, and shiny now will most likely be unpopular, old, and dull.