“Every entrepreneur needs to learn how to dance between wild levels of enthusiasm and paralyzing levels of fear every single hour.”
- Jared Yellin
I believe that the entrepreneurial tug-of-war is your make or break as an entrepreneur…
If you can handle the extremes - you will make it.
If you can’t handle the extremes - you will break.
It’s just NOT for the faint of heart and I do believe that since entrepreneurship has become “the thing to do” over the past 5-6 years, the reality of what it actually means has been watered down by…
Misleading social media pictures…
Ridiculous ads of people walking around rented homes…
Absurd showiness of things that come from success but with people who have not gotten there yet…
Very cool office space with ping pong tables and free lunch…
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but entrepreneurship is freakin PAINFUL…
It’s lonely…
It’s exciting…
It’s bloody…
It’s fun…
It’s exhilarating…
It’s exhausting…
It’s every emotion that you can imagine minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, and year by year…
And it never changes…
I have been an entrepreneur for 16 years and even now that many would say - you made it - I still battle the tug-of-war DAILY!
I wake up with doubt…
I workout with frustration...
I eat lunch with enthusiasm…
I shower with blood…
I have dinner with exhaustion…
I close my eyes with exhilaration…
And these are just the milestones of the day…
In between each milestone is NOT a walk around my beautiful pool with a cold drink sitting by the lake as I write notes in my black book.
YES, I have a pool…
YES, I live on a lake…
YES, I have a black book…
But NO - this is a freakin tug-of-war!
WHY ME?!?!
I thought about this for years…
WHY ME?!?!
Why can’t I just be normal…
Why can’t I just shake this ambition…
Why can’t I just let someone else do it…
When I first got going as an entrepreneur, I used to think about this ALL of the time…
My friends were going on spring break…
My friends were partying it up Thursday through Saturday night…
My friends would get together to watch TV Series…
And I was deep in the trenches of my mission…
WHY ME?!?!
Have you ever felt this way?
Like, if you are a true-bred entrepreneur who is willing to risk it ALL for you believe…
How many times do you say...WHY ME?!?!
Let’s get real - this is what EVERY entrepreneur thinks EVEN THOUGH we can’t imagine any other way of operating.
AND YES, parts of it become MUCH easier…
But there are also parts of entrepreneurship that will NEVER be easy…
For me…
I don’t have the same financial pressures that I once did - things are very strong in that domain - but I have a new pressure called 100’s and eventually 1,000’s of lives aka MY TEAM!
And I have this new intensity called...my Co-Founders and Investors…
And And And I have this heavy task of being really loud and bold about what I will accomplish...10,000 tech companies in 10 years and 10,000’s of people know…
My point is this…
YES, parts of entrepreneurship DO get easier…
But NO, the tug-of-war will NEVER disappear!
I wrote this article for only one reason…
To validate how you feel!
YES, you are NOT crazy!
YES, you are NOT alone!
YES, you are NOT normal!
YES, you are EXACTLY where you should be if entrepreneurship chose you and you said YES!
I think it’s really important that we don’t over fabricate how difficult entrepreneurship is…
And NOT just for the entrepreneur…
Their family…
Their friends…
Their team…
EVERYONE!
It’s just HARD...DAMN HARD!
And it’s absolutely CRITICAL that if you are considering this path that you get HOW HARD it is because the last thing I want is for you to be blindsided.
I would rather try to convince you NOT to pursue entrepreneurship and have you battle me on why you have what it takes then to make you feel like you have what it takes when you don’t.
From what I have been told, entrepreneurs face deep mental challenges…
Suicide rates are high…
Depression is soaring…
Overall health is compromised…
YES, entrepreneurship is FREAKIN cool - but it’s only RIGHT for the RIGHT person who is able, willing, and crazy enough to step into this wild tug-of-war.
Make sure you have what it takes - and if/when you do - get after it with all you got!
Live with Intention,
