When I was younger – often I was envious of friends and acquaintances and even instructors that I had heard about who:

Boasted larger student active counts than my own.

Had huge, beautiful facilities;

Who's gross was touted to be larger than mine.

Over the year's having been there – done that at every level I've started to realize what never really came to mind in my younger days:

Happiness on a daily basis is really more important than all those ego building but often misleading measures of success.

Your net is way more important than your gross. In fact your gross is only important RELATIVE to your expense structure.

Your facility should do two things:

Present a positive first impression to prospective students and a quality learning environment to your current students.

Have adequate space to safely and efficiently teach your existing active count – taking into account maximizing your space utilization through proper scheduling, etc.

Everything else is EGO.

Lifestyle counts! Work 100 hours a week for $200,000 or 40 hours per week and make $100,000 – which really enhances your life more?

Wait a minute! If I had hobbies – what would they be?

Did I miss the kids growing up?

Do I take time to learn and grow?

How about relaxation and recharge time.

Wealth. Live below your means. Make intelligent decisions so as to accumulate assets. Long term security is based upon REAL assets. Real Estate, Bonds, Publicly Traded Stocks (including mutual and index funds) and our bank balance. Balance your current life-style expenses with building for the future.

Impress your clients (students and parents) not your competitors and peers. Let's face it – why do you care what the other martial arts guys think?