Today I spent the day ripping out a giant tree root in my front yard.
It must have weighed at least 500 lbs – maybe more.
It my third day working on this project.
The other two days I spent digging a big trench around the root to get at the big roots an to cut them.
Here’s a picture of the tree stump before I ripped it out today.
…and here’s a picture of me standing by the root, taken from the other side, for scale…
What you see in these pictures was the starting point for me this morning.
It appears that with all that digging that was done around the root, it should just be easy to just push the root over right?
Not likely. 🙂
The roots on this tree were so deep and they intertwined themselves between a whole bunch of rock and very heavy and sticky clay soil.
My John Deer tractor couldn’t even budge this thing a millimeter when I started.
In fact, about 5 hours in to the “mission”, I had dug out an even deeper trench around the root and used a chainsaw and a reciprocating saw to cut out some of the more larger roots and the stump STILL wouldn’t even budge when I tried pulling it with a heavy chain attached to my tractor.
Not even a wiggle.
Nothing.
Solid just like it was before I started digging on Thursday!
A part of me really wanted to just give up, and call in a professional with a bigger tractor or heavier equipment to just do it for me.
However, that would have meant that I had let the stump beat me.
And I didn’t want that to happen.
See, as an entrepreneur, one of the most important skills you can develop is mental toughness.
The ability to face unfavorable situations and circumstances and to keep going even when it seems like NOTHING you’re doing is working.
It sure felt that way today when I went to pull that log out with my tractor and even after all that digging for HOURS, it wouldn’t even move a millimeter.
I was exhausted.
I wanted to give up.
But I didn’t.
I took a short break, got something to drink and then went back out there to finish the job.
About 6-7 hours into the digging and cutting of the roots around the stump, I finally saw the stump wiggle a tiny little bit when I pulled it with the tractor.
Once I saw that, I knew I has this sucker beat.
I did manage to move it over a few feet, ripping out any roots that were holding it to the ground, but then I learned the battle was just beginning.
Just because I got the stump to move didn’t mean I had it out the hole!
It took everything my John Deere had to flip the root over on it’s side, exposing the underbelly.
The underbelly of the root was FULL of rocks, roots, and CLAY.
Ever try to lift anything made out of clay? Â It’s HEAVY!
Now imagine a tree root made up of nothing but rocks and clay – LOL.
Let’s just say it was heavy.
When I tried leaning up against the root and pushing it with everything I had, it didn’t even budge a little. 🙂
What I had to do then was to flip the root on it’s side, then move the tractor to the other wide of the hole and fill the hole with some dirt, then flip the root back over on top of that dirt – essentially raising it a few feet.
Then I had to flip it again the other way, and now fill the other side of the hole.
That’s what I kept doing. Â Re-positioning the tractor to opposite sides and flipping the root back and forth, and filling the hole with more and more dirt each time.
Then I FINALLY had the root OUT of the hole at ground level.
Then it was just a matter of cutting the stump flush with the root since I didn’t need to use it for flipping leverage anymore, and getting it dragged to the other side of my property.
All in all, it took me over 9 hours to get this done and by the time I was done I was exhausted but feeling very accomplished.
I worked on this all by myself, with just my tractor, my chainsaw, my reciprocating saw, some shovels, a super heavy duty chain and my MIND to help me.
Once in a while I like doing stuff like this to help me build my mental toughness as an entrepreneur.
Since I mostly make my money with businesses that are Internet based, I don’t have to do any “manual labor” to make my income like some people do.
Sometimes I forget just how fortunate I am to be able to make money from home running Internet businesses and taking on a challenge like this tree stump helps me to stay grateful for how awesome my “job” really is.
I have a lot of respect for people who have to work manual labor jobs every day, but I definitely don’t envy them.
Especially people who have had to work hard labor all of their lives and are now in their later years and their bodies just can’t do it anymore, but they’re forced to in order to pay the bills.
It’s people like that who I think would most benefit from building a business income online to augment and eventually replace their hard labor jobs.
What have you done lately to challenge your mental toughness?
Have you been shying away from a challenge?
If you’re an entrepreneur, you may want to consider taking on a challenge outside of your comfort zone.
It may just be the thing that helps you to develop the mental toughness needed to take your business to the next level.
It doesn’t have to be ripping out tree stumps.
It can be anything that challenges you.
One thing I can definitely say after working on that tree stump for 9 hours today is that I’m so glad that I get to make money from home as a blogger. 🙂
P.s. If you work a manual labor job, and you’d like to one day be free of it, I highly recommend joining me in Empower Network so that one day you don’t have to work so hard anymore!
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