Last year I wondered how many magazines our business mailed in just a year. When the simple math told me 1.3 million, I was stunned!

How often do we look at our businesses from a new, telling standpoint? How was it I had not done that simple equation in such a long time? Do we get buried in details and forget to come up for air? Maybe.

Reality tells us, especially at this tax time of year, that we have totaled all kinds of numbers.

My recent venture into total magazines mailed tells me we most likely never think to get every number, no matter how significant. But every number has inherent meaning â€" a meaning to us personally, as well as to each in the group, and not just as a business.

The beautiful state of Vermont, I learned just before writing this column, produces 1.3 million gallons of maple syrup a year. I love having something â€" anything! â€" in common with that proud and magnificent state.

The beauty of numbers is in what slice of our business, ourselves individually, and our team members, each number illuminates. What mailing 1.3 million magazines in a year says about our team is that it is a well oiled machine. Is it easy? It can appear to be. Its results say it is. The monthly deadline suggests it has to be. But it has been 36 years in the making with a lot of struggle, missteps, successes, celebrations, and everything life has in it in between.

No business is one person. One person usually gets the accolades. One person never does it all. In fact, a business is a piece of everyone working in it, for it.

If we wonder if that is true, let one person just count everything produced in a business. Just count, nothing else. Then let us tell each person how much we appreciate their efforts which produce the end product.