Kelly, a long time friend and business owner, invited me to meet her for coffee and a chat at Starbucks. Kelly told me that she had experienced a bad day from start to finish. It started out with a time-consuming, late-paying, difficult client showing up at her office without an appointment. And it ended when one of her friends phoned to whine about personal problems. Kelly told her caller that she was very busy and could not talk. To Kelly's shock, her friend accused her of being insensitive to the needs of other people.

I listened while Kelly related the details and I responded with a story from an East Indian friend of mine:

One day a man watched a scorpion crawl around the edge of a pond. The wrong move caused the scorpion to fall into the water. The man rushed to the rescue and was greeted by a painful sting from the scorpion. He snatched his arm out of the water, let out a painful groan, and began to rub his wound. After a couple of minutes he looked into the pond and saw the scorpion fighting for its life. his second attempt met with a second sting. The intense pain brought tears to his eyes. A man passing by had observed the first sting of the scorpion and was amazed that the rescuer would try a second time. As the man started to reach into the water for the third time, the observer approached him. "What do you think you're doing?" the observer asked in amazement. "This poor creature feel into the water and I was trying to save its life before it drowns," replied this good Samaritan. "And every time I try to help the scorpion it stings me. I don't understand it. I can't just leave it there to die while knowing I could have helped. Can't you understand that?" The observer replied "You cannot save the scorpion without harming yourself! It is the nature of the scorpion to sting, and that includes the one trying to save its life!"

The sting of the scorpion is usually not fatal, but it is irritating and quite painful. Like the scorpion, it is the nature of some people to "sting" even when you are giving them your best. This hold true with people in both your business and private lives: clients, customers, employees, so-called friends and yes sometimes even relatives. There are some people whom you cannot help without harming yourself.

Take a look at your surroundings and flush out the hidden scorpions. They usually take the form of late payers, folks demanding unreasonable financial requests, or people taking up huge blocks of your time responding to "their special needs." And there are those who drop their venom on your hopes and dreams with their unsolicited negative comments and opinions. Most often they are drowning in their own private misery, and the more you help the harder they bite. They are time, money and attention bandits with the uncanny ability to make you feel guilty while they are stinging you.

When you find these types of people in your environment, take three deep breaths and let them GO! Let them go without feelings of guilt or fear that you or your business will suffer. In fact, you will find that you can be more productive without them. Many business people fear that to tell the scorpion client or associate to get lost will impact their business. They are absolutely right! You and your business can become more efficient and prosper with fewer stings to nurse.

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