Instead of doing the mental arithmetic I'll save you the pain … thirty five hours a week, fourty six weeks a year gets to around $16 million a year.

How unachievable is that?

Sounds a bit surreal doesn't it … earning $10,000 an hour. I'm beginning to sound like one of those internet marketers who promise untold ritches.

May be you have a problem in getting this concept sorted in your mind, the same as I did, but when I really looked at the concept it really is achievable.

I've observed myself and others over the last couple of weeks and it is evident that we limit our potential by … limiting our potential.

At times ideas come to us that can make or save our businesses $10,000, over any given period. All it takes is about an hour of our time to nut out, establish and implement an ongoing action plan and whammo $10,000 made or saved.

Why don't we do this?

More often than not it's just that we ignore the $10,000 hours when the look us in the face. We are so busy with our billable hours we ignore them.

I was reminded of this concept when I recently read the Peanuts cartoon where Lucy, the "proprietor" of the "psychiatric booth", was giving advice for five cents to the other characters in the strip, most frequently an anxious Charlie Brown.

The sign over the stand read "The Psychiatrist is In - 5 Cents Please."

"Why do you charge five cents?" Charlie Brown asked her one day.

"It's what the market will bear," Lucy replied.

But how do you decide "what the market will bear" and is that really the right way to price your professional, technical, trade, and creative services?

What's your hourly charge out rate?

$75, $100, $150, $300 or may be its $600+? I bet it's not $10,000!

Hourly charge out rates are good things for business

Focusing on an hourly rate is appropriate in that it focuses your mind on those activities that aren't worth your charge out rate that you are doing.

How many low pay off hours do you waste?

For example, you could recruit someone to offload much of the $10/hour and $20/hour work, so you can focus on the $10,000 per hour you are capable of.

Once you become aware that you're wasting time on low payoff activities, then you can begin reducing, eliminating, or outsourcing all those low payoff tasks.

Why hourly charge out rates are bad

The big problem is that when you tell yourself your time is worth $75/hour, you're simultaneously telling yourself that it isn't worth $150/hour or $300/hour or even $10,000/hour.

What you focus on, you receive. Your focus is on $75 per hour and that's the sort of work you receive and the sort of opportunities you go after.

The $10,000 per hour opportunities won't even come up on the radar, you will unconsciously ignore them. "I earn $75 per hour so I look for $75/hour opportunities".

Get clear on what your value is worth.

When I talk about the $10,000 per hour I'm not talking about every billable hour you may have. You may have some $50, $134, $287 hours as well as your $75 hours and from time to time you may have some $10,000 hours.

Remember that one $10,000 hour is worth 133 $75 hours.

That's more than a month of full-time work!

You don't need too many of those huge payoff hours to pick up the slack of some of those toxic $0-20 hours, but if you miss out on just one of those $10,000 hours, it blows away all the financial productivity figures you can ever think or envision.

All Hours Are Not Created Equal

As a small business owner you would already be aware that your income isn't based on how much time you spend working. It's a function of the value you create and deliver to your clients.

You can work a whole month and produce your charge out rate each and every hour, but in one or two breakthrough hours you could earn $10,000 or $20,000.

Every hour is unique.

In the long run, the greatest financial risk your business faces isn't whether you made the mistake of giving in and doing the $20/hour work when you could have done the $85/hour work.

Your greatest risk is missing the $10,000 hours.

Why do we miss the $10,000 hours?

Because we figure they are for someone else.

The attitude that is required to shift from the $75/hour to $150/hour work is not the same as that required to face, see the possibilities and implement a $10,000 hour opportunity.

Your mind has to be open to the possibility; you must see the opportunity when it waves its hand at you and not see it as something for someone else.

$10,000 for just one hour of your time … scary isn't it?

The dollars aren't what's scary actually it that you don't give your self permission to see these opportunities, to come up with the opportunities that will actually earn that $10,000 hour.

Stop right here … is there such an opportunity staring you in the face right now but you can't see it because you aren't attuned to the opportunity?

What is the real possibility?

Once you get your head around the possibility that there are some $10,000 hours, even some $20,000 hours, you will immediately begin to see more and more of them, so many that you'll wonder why you'd never seen them before

In discussing this concept with a client he likened the process to the new car view of the world. You look at buying a new car you figure the colour and interior are different from those you've seen. You take delivery and guess what … every day you see more and more of exactly the same vehicle everywhere.

Why is this? Your view has changed.

Some of you may be thinking … this guy is just focusing on the money!

I disagree I'm focusing on possibilities, value and changing your thinking and perception.

If you charge out $75/hour it doesn't mean you can't have the occasional $10,000 hour.

It can be a fun thing. Think of it as you would as a kid finding a $1 on the street. In amongst your $75 hours suddenly there is a $10,000 idea. Don't ignore it … stop and ask your self … is this something that my business needs me to deal with? Can we use it? If not do I know someone who can use it? If you can use it then DO SOMETHING about it if not then hand on the idea.

Get rid of the limiting beliefs.

Once you free yourself from the limiting theory of "just my billable hour", you'll invite all the possibilities into your mind and you'll begin to enjoy some of those $10,000 hours.

It really is just a matter of giving yourself permission to openly experience them.