Imagine you are walking with a good friend, a business mentor, down the beach having a friendly, lively and stimulating conversation. At one point your friend stops and turns to you and says, “Walk with me into the ocean.” You both turn and begin to walk into the surf.

Now in your imagination see yourself entering the surf, the waves hitting at first around your ankles and the water is cool and refreshing. You follow your friend into the surf until the water is waist high.  As he continues to walk, you follow him silently further into the surf. You think to yourself, “What is the lesson my friend is trying to teach me?”

Your past experience with your friend and mentor is that he will often use times together to prove a point or teach you something of value.  He knows telling you something is not nearly as effective as getting you physically or emotionally involved. So, with trust and anticipation you continue walking silently with your friend deeper and deeper into the surf.

As the water gets to shoulder height, you reach out and grab your friend’s arm and ask him, “What’s the point?” Your friend turns towards you and grabs your head and with both of his hands pushes you under the water, completely catching you off guard. As he continues to hold you under the crashing waves, you wonder again what might be the lesson or point from this exercise.

As you begin to run out of air, adrenaline rushes through your body and you desperately struggle to get back to the surface. Punching and kicking now to get free your air supply is exhausted and you black out.  Your friend pulls you ashore and resuscitates you.

Regaining consciousness, you angrily strike out at your friend as he has never tried to hurt you before. With fire in your eyes you accuse your friend of trying to drown you.  As he helps you up from the wet sand he states, “If I had intended to drown you, I would not have pulled you ashore.”

You scream back at him, “Then why did you do that?” He calmly replies, “When you desire cash flow in your business like you desired that breath of air, then you shall have it!”

You realize your friend and mentor knows you are struggling in your business and you are ignoring the fact cash flow for your business is like oxygen for your body – life.  Your business cannot exist without cash flow just as your body couldn’t exist without air.  Because your friend is smart, understands you and wants to see you succeed, he was trying to save you and your business.  He knew the only way that could happen was to truly change your attitude about cash flow projections and a cash flow management system for your business. 

You now understand the need to implement a system to monitor the flow of cash in your business letting you know where you stand at any moment as well as where you are headed in the future. Having the answers to these two questions, rather than being in a desperate, reactive, survival mode, you can, with much less stress and anxiety, come up with ways to  create and sustain cash flow bringing life and longevity to your  business.  

Now imagine the joy of fulfilling your desire to provide things for yourself, your family, your employees and customers and to make a difference in other people’s lives, in your community and ultimately the world.