4 Ways TV Is Bad For Your Business

Is TV hurting your business productivity? I'd like to demonstrate a few ways in which watching too much television can actually harm your efforts towards having a thriving business.

1) TV watching encourages passivity

Watching TV requires less energy and initiative than any other activity. Did you know that while watching television, your metabolism actually lowers to a level between resting and sleeping?

It's obvious how this tendency towards passivity and dependence could be bad for your business. Being an entrepreneur requires creativity, initiative and a lot of work. The habit of watching TV works against those traits by making you lose the human struggle of doing nothing versus doing something. Simply put, excessive TV viewing encourages laziness.

2) TV makes you tired and depressed

Have you ever watched tv for two or three hours at a clip, only to get up from your couch in a fog, a haze, not really aware of why or how you had wasted the last few hours of your life? Did you feel tired or curiously wired? Depressed? TV is stimulating to the nervous system but since you're physically and mentally inactive, it's all build up with no climax.

It takes a lot of energy to succeed in a business endeavor. If you're using TV "to relax", why not take a nap or get some exercise? They're both health-promoting activities that also relieve mental stress.

3) TV promotes a negative philosophy

Most of the content of television is negative and sarcastic. In order to succeed in business, you need a positive attitude. You need to believe that you can achieve your goals, that you have personal power.

You may be surprised to hear that a study of college freshman showed a link between a lot of tv viewing and a negative view of businesspeople.

It's understandable that many success coaches in the network marketing and direct sales industries encourage new recruits to go on a "news fast" for the first 6 months of building their business. Certainly time can be better spent by working on the business, but it's more than that. Watching the news can give you a negative worldview. Is there ever anything positive reported on the news? Good news just doesn't sell.

During down periods, why not read inspirational books, or study marketing material in order to hone your sales skills?

I've noticed that everyone on tv is either independently wealthy or poor and struggling. The haves never go to work, just like they never eat or brush their teeth! And the have-nots are stuck in a cycle of debt, despair, overwork and the inevitable family problems that result. Are these extremes something you want to spend a lot of time taking in?

4) Television Sucks Up Valuable Time

The average American spend 4 hours a day watching television. You're probably exceptional and don't watch that much, but even still, there are many more productive things you could be doing in the time that you do watch. One way to save time is to get your news online. You can read the latest headlines and click on more information and spend only 15 minutes getting the day's news stories. Time spent watching tv is time you're not growing your business.

Why not take a moment to think about how the TV habit may be impacting your financial future?

Carrie Lauth is the author of http://www.NaturalMomBusinessGuide.com, a step by step ebook, audio and video tutorial for women who want to start an online business marketing their natural products.