Acres Of Diamonds

A True Story That Can Change Your Life in 2010 by Ken Marsh

Several years ago, as a distributor in this industry, I was working hard to grow my network marketing business. Like many distributors, I was approached by what seemed like countless numbers of people each month – all claiming they had “the next big opportunity” in the network marketing industry.

Sound familiar? Do YOU get any of those calls or emails from people claiming they found a “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity to make truckloads of money for doing almost nothing?

Anyway, I have to admit that I was curious enough in the beginning of my network marketing career to invest my most precious resource, my time, looking at almost every one of these “opportunities” that people put in front of me. Unfortunately, the more I looked…the more confused I got. Worse yet, my own business wasn’t growing and my income was shrinking.

But then I heard a story that changed my thinking…and multiplied my income.

This is THAT story…

ACRES OF DIAMONDS by Earl Nightingale

The story — a true one — is told of an African farmer who heard tales about other farmers who had made millions by discovering diamond mines. These tales so excited the farmer that he could hardly wait to sell his farm and go prospecting for diamonds himself. He sold the farm and spent the rest of his life wandering the African continent searching unsuccessfully for the gleaming gems that brought such high prices on the markets of the world. Finally, worn out and in a fit of despondency, he threw himself into a river and drowned.

Meanwhile, the man who had bought his farm happened to be crossing the small stream on the property one day, when suddenly there was a bright flash of blue and red light from the stream bottom. He bent down and picked up a stone. It was a good-sized stone, and admiring it, he brought it home and put it on his fireplace mantel as an interesting curiosity.

Several weeks later a visitor picked up the stone, looked closely at it, hefted it in his hand, and nearly fainted. He asked the farmer if he knew what he’d found. When the farmer said, no, that he thought it was a piece of crystal, the visitor told him he had found one of the largest diamonds ever discovered. The farmer had trouble believing that. He told the man that his creek was full of such stones, not all as large as the one on the mantel, but sprinkled generously throughout the creek bottom.

The farm the first farmer had sold, so that he might find a diamond mine, turned out to be one of the most productive diamond mines on the entire African continent. The first farmer had owned, free and clear … acres of diamonds. But he had sold them for practically nothing, in order to look for them elsewhere. The moral is clear: If the first farmer had only taken the time to study and prepare himself to learn what diamonds looked like in their rough state, and to thoroughly explore the property he had before looking elsewhere, all of his wildest dreams would have come true.

The thing about this story that has so profoundly affected millions of people is the idea that each of us is, at this very moment, standing in the middle of our own acres of diamonds. If we had only had the wisdom and patience to intelligently and effectively explore the work in which we’re now engaged, to explore ourselves, we would most likely find the riches we seek, whether they be financial or intangible or both.

Before you go running off to what you think are greener pastures, make sure that your own is not just as green or perhaps even greener. It has been said that if the other guy’s pasture appears to be greener than ours, it’s quite possible that it’s getting better care. Besides, while you’re looking at other pastures, other people are looking at yours.

There’s just as much opportunity in one business as another, if we’ll only stop playing copycat and begin to think creatively, in new directions. It’s there, believe me. And it’s your job to find it.

The evidence is all around us…
It’s sad. I see many people I know in this industry jump from company to company to company searching for the riches and success they desire but never finding success. (Do you know anyone like this?) If only they would take the time to recognize that their “acres of diamonds” actually lie within themselves…and NOT in the next big opportunity that comes along.

I’ve seen people in Xooma spend the majority of their time in frustration trying to figure out how to sponsor people in a foreign country half way around the world…yet they’ve never talked to the people who live on their own street or in their own town about their Xooma business. If only they would realize that they’re standing in the middle of their own “acres of diamonds” right where they live!

I’ve met numerous people in the past year that joined Xooma, quit Xooma and then re-joined Xooma again. When welcoming these individuals back to the Xooma Family I usually ask them why they left us to begin with. In almost every case they talk about how they thought the “grass was greener” someplace else only to discover (the hard way) that they already had (and now have again) “acres of diamonds” waiting to be harvested in Xooma.

So what about you?

Are you like the farmer in the story who sold his farm looking for riches elsewhere? Or, do you believe that you are standing in the middle of your own acres of diamonds at this very moment?

This simple, yet powerful story dramatically changed the way I thought about my life and my business. It caused me to think differently which allowed me to enjoy far more abundance and success as a result. My wish for you is that this story truly empowers you, like it did me, to create a whole new future for yourself and your Xooma business in 2010.

Quick…look down! I think that’s a diamond under your foot.