The Spiritual Route to Entrepreneurial Success: From Harassed Sole Trader to Visionary Ceo

© 2016 John Reynard. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 04/06/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-9218-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-9219-0 (e)

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Contents

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Who This Book Is For

Chapter 1 Personal Story

Chapter 2 The Power of Intuition

Chapter 3 Vision Outperforms Planning

Chapter 4 Transforming Self-Limiting Beliefs

Chapter 5 Integrity and Trust Are Gold Standards

Chapter 6 Forgiveness Leads to Freedom

Chapter 7 Self-Empowerment

Chapter 8 The Quantum Leap of Co-Creation and Joint Purpose

Chapter 9 Route to Abundance

Chapter 10 The Visionary CEO

Bibliography

Glossary

To my father, who imparted to me a desire to shape my own destiny and become an entrepreneur

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to all those with whom I have come into contact in my business life. They include some of the most visionary and generous people you could ever wish to meet. Some of them are mentioned in the book, but for reasons of confidentiality where appropriate, I have changed their names.

I am eternally grateful to all those I have ever employed and had the pleasure of working with. They have taught me so much about myself, and I feel privileged to have had their dedication and commitment.

To my wife, Sue, who shares my interests in all matters spiritual. She has a creative flair for business and has stuck with me through thick and thin. On many occasions, she has brought a sense of practicality to my vague ideas and shown me another way of seeing whatever challenge was presenting itself. She also did a great job at proofreading this book.

To Sarah Alexander, who has given honest feedback on the message I have been trying to put across. In so doing, she has deepened my understanding of my own spirituality.

To Caroline Swain, who edited the book so thoroughly and in the process taught me how to write better English.

To Alison Goldie, who was the first to read the whole book and encouraged me to introduce examples from other successful businesses and to Alison McKenny, who took the photographs for the cover.

To Emile Kosviner, Ian Leppard, William Revell, Brian Courtney and Liam Mottram and all other friends and acquaintances, who have contributed insight, support and encouragement.

To those brilliant authors whose words I quote; they have provided huge inspiration to me.

To AuthorHouse, for publishing and presenting this book and bringing it to market.

FOREWORD

by Nick Williams

The interesting thing about John Reynard is that he has successfully integrated his sense of spirituality into his life as an entrepreneur. Although many view the world of business as unscrupulous and deceitful -- the polar opposite of everything spiritual -- he shows in this book how self-centred, egocentric thinking is actually counterproductive. Often with the use of amusing anecdotes, he demonstrates how trust, integrity, and compassion are essential to success and real abundance. I have read many books on how to succeed as an entrepreneur, but I do not know of any others written by someone who has lived out his spiritual principles and built a significant company.

John is not religious in the traditional sense -- quite the opposite -- but he does believe we all possess a Higher Self that is compassionate and loving, and that represents the truth of who we really are.

Those entrepreneurs who are constantly working in the business rather than on it, and who struggle to find the right staff, will be motivated to look first within themselves. They will see that blaming others and outer circumstances are easy options that in the end emasculate them. It will open their eyes to letting go of the barriers preventing them from attracting the right people. It will introduce them in a practical way to the benefits of staff participation in decision making and demonstrate how business can be taken to new heights once others are given freedom to express their own creativity.

Personally, I believe there are many in the business world who have similar beliefs to John but feel they cannot come out and say so. They fear they will be misunderstood, rebuked, and even mocked. This book will give them courage to be authentic in their own communications. Those entrepreneurs who do follow their gut instincts and know the value of so doing will recognise a lot of what John says about intuition. They will be delighted because he takes this whole subject to a much greater depth. For those with a definite spiritual interest, it will substantiate and explain a lot of what they have felt themselves but have never been able to put into words. It will inspire them and give them faith that living in alignment with their Higher Self, or Spirit, will lead them to success and abundance.

A key element of John's message is to follow one's inspiration -- a subject close to my own heart. When I was a child, I felt I had a calling, something I was born to be and do. I was drawn to certain areas like literature and creativity, as if a natural intelligence was guiding me. But little by little I learned to mistrust and override that intelligence and do what I thought I was supposed to do. I listened and believed the voices of others rather than my own inner voice. I had a successful career in IT sales and marketing. On the surface I looked like a success, but I didn't really feel it. That voice of my natural intelligence was still there, nudging me to leave my corporate career behind, but I was too terrified to change.

I eventually had the courage to let go, and I started my own business. I have experienced many ups and downs, but twenty-five years later, I have written ten books, been invited to seventeen different countries to speak, and worked with many household companies. I feel I am fulfilling my own potential, and I believe this is what can happen for all of us when we follow our natural intelligence.

John is a passionate advocate of teaching entrepreneurial leaders to know that they have this deeper, natural intelligence. He is a flag bearer for a new generation of entrepreneurial leaders who are seeking entirely new ways of doing business. He helps them understand that by aligning with their Higher Selves, they will be guided to make wise and truly intelligent decisions that will help them create sustainable long-term business success.

The book outlines a clear journey of how it is possible to move from being a harassed sole trader to an enterprise that functions consistently and profitably without their daily involvement. It is a very readable book for open-minded entrepreneurs, and it describes the route to becoming a truly visionary CEO.

Read on, and be inspired.

Nick Williams

Author of The Work We Were Born to Do and Unconditional Success

WHO THIS BOOK IS FOR

This is not another book about best practice and how to succeed in business; there are plenty of those already. It is for those who have a passion for entrepreneurship, who seek to prosper, and who want to build their dreams in accordance with their highest thinking and beliefs.

Entrepreneurs bring about innovation and effect change. Without them, the economy would stagnate. We are all familiar with the likes of Sir Richard Branson and Lord Sugar, but for every entrepreneur who has made a million, there are thousands who struggle for years and only partially succeed. They work incredibly hard, take huge risks, create employment for others, sign over their homes to merciless banks, and pay their full share of taxes. All this, and yet they never attain the levels of return they truly deserve.

Such was my own case. I had turned sixty by the time I created a business that ran independently of me and generated sufficient profit to cover more than my living costs. I had some good years, but they were always interspersed with poor ones, and the latter quickly drained away any assets I had accumulated. Whilst those around me seemed to go from strength to strength, I felt stuck in the doldrums and very alone. I suspect many entrepreneurs empathise with this plight.

My own situation began to change when I ceased separating my spiritual life from my business life and committed to integrating the two. I had always reckoned there was more to life than a one-way ticket from cradle to grave. I have always thought that within each of us, there is an essence, a Higher Self that is pure, remains forever unblemished, and seeks the best for everyone. I believed this but failed to live out such spiritual principles in my day job. I was fearful that if I made reference to them, I would not be taken seriously and would even be ridiculed. I conformed, but whilst I thought I was playing safe by denying my spirituality, I was actually creating a split that was costing me my success. There was a rift between how I showed up in business and my real, authentic self. I was blocking access to my own essence, my core being, and the source of my spontaneity, creativity and power. I held myself back from abundance and confined myself to mediocrity.

A major theme of the book is that we create our own worlds. The state of our business reflects the state of our mind. When we genuinely feel positive and our head and heart are aligned, we attract positive results. When we are joined with our Higher Self, that essence within us that is all-knowing, we embark on an awesome journey that leads us to a deep sense of fulfilment. Every time we pursue negative thoughts, they get reflected back to us, usually in the form of problems. But there are no challenges without purpose; each and every one comes for a reason. By accepting, understanding, and healing our negative attitudes and beliefs, we transform them, grow as people, and attract real abundance into our lives.

This book will be of little interest to those arrogant enough to believe they have a Midas touch that turns everything into gold. Neither will it speak to those who have no belief in anything beyond what is immediately in front of them. It is for entrepreneurs who are open to looking at their lives differently and want to understand who they really are. It is a book about how to realise our full potential through self-empowerment, cooperation with others, and alignment with our Higher Selves. It seeks to demonstrate that entrepreneurship provides a meaningful vehicle through which we can discover the lives we are truly destined to live. It will inspire:

• harassed sole traders and small company entrepreneurs who value integrity and want to grow their business to a size where it is no longer dependent on them and achieves significant inherent value

• entrepreneurs and forward-thinking company executives who seek to live their business lives in alignment with their highest ideals

CHAPTER 1

Personal Story

Initiation into Business

I have only ever been employed for three years, and that was at the beginning of my career. After reaching the end of my student days, I looked at my contemporaries taking up what seemed to me to be rather humdrum nine-to-five jobs, and I thought, 'This is not really what I want.' I knew it was time to earn a living, and I was ready to commit to a regular job, but there in the background lurked a niggle, a desire to add something a bit extra. I had lived in London and enjoyed it, but now I was keen to live abroad. I felt drawn to France. My view was that if I was going to settle into a job, I'd rather do it in a place where I could also experience a different culture and