Making a hard decision? Here's what helped me

One of the toughest decisions I have ever had to make in my business, and honestly in my life, came a few years back. We had our energy company here in America, and the laws were changing in state after state. The opportunity existed because of the way the laws were written, and now they were rewriting them. I watched this beautiful business we had spent twenty years building start to evaporate right in front of me.

Fortunately, we had already started a company over in Italy. Meanwhile, back home, I had just moved into a gorgeous house right on the water. We had renovated the whole thing, one of the most beautiful places you have ever seen, and we had been living in it only a matter of months.

And with all of that going on, I made a decision. I needed to move to Italy and run the company over there.

Pack your bags

Try that conversation. I went to my wife and said, I know we just moved in here, but pack your bags, we are moving to Italy. Then I told my friends, my family, everybody: dear old dad is disappearing across the pond. It was a freaky thing. It was difficult. But I knew it to be true. I knew I needed to go do this.

I made the decision in November. The first week of March, I sent my wife over ahead of me to find our house and get it ready, so that when I showed up we would have a place to stay. My flight was March 21. That turned out to be the day the world locked down for COVID, and I had to fight through all of it, hunting for flights, just to get there.

Everybody back in Florida freaked out. What are you doing? You looked at a map of the world and Italy was the brightest red country on the entire thing. It was crazy. But I knew I was doing the right thing. The decision was made, and within months I picked my entire life up and moved it to Italy.

Trust your knowingness

Here is the lesson inside the story. Everybody has a knowingness. When you look at a situation, you have a thought, and right there you can do one of two things.

You can start in with the what abouts and the what ifs. What about this, what if that, around and around until your neck breaks. You can sit there and spin around the world that way. Or you can admit the truth: you knew. The moment you looked at it, you knew. The only real question is whether you get in there and act on what you already know.

You have got to learn to trust your knowingness. Look at the situation, figure it out, and when it feels right, that is your answer.

There is no preparation

Once you know, get into action. People love the idea of preparing forever, and I will tell you something: there is no preparation. Come on, how do you move? You pack your bags. You put your clothes in the bag, you put everything else in the truck, or in my case a big sea container, and you just move it. You make things happen.

The faster you can make it happen, the higher the chance you are going to succeed. Sit around making long lists of pros and cons, what if this and what about that, and you are going to die of worry. Trust yourself. Get in there and get into action.

What if you fail?

Somebody always asks it, so let me answer it. What if you fail? So you get back up and you get going again. That is the whole answer.

And start believing in yourself, because if you cannot do that, nobody else can either. It shows, too. When you believe in yourself, other people start believing in you equally as well. That is how a hard decision turns into a new life. You know, you trust the knowing, and you move.