Starting a business feels liberating. It gives you freedom to play by your own rules. People often time ask when do I get sleep? The answer is at night and, sometimes small naps during the day. How? Because, I am taking my time, and carefully organizing and building as I go.
It is not easy starting from zero, but each day is a new lesson. Each new lesson has taught me volumes about myself. It’s so easy to sit, listening to the unsolicited advice of random strangers, and roll my eyes because it always feels like they assume a lot more than they know. But, then they say something I hadn’t thought about, and I’m humbled and remind myself that this is just the beginning of my journey. Sometimes I isolate myself thinking everyone is against me and end up hurting myself in the process because I cut myself off from networking opportunities.
Starting a business feels like entering a new school for the first time. A school made specifically for your business. There are the industry snobs (popular kids) that have made a pretty successful run of their careers thus far, and stick there nose up at you for not being on their level. They have the ability to move into a mentoring stage if they’d just come down off of their pedestals and grow a little patience for the newcomers. Some newcomers become industry snobs quickly, as they come into business at just the right timing. Others build slowly and and stay in the game a little longer. But, it’s really different for everyone.
Differentiating yourself is what its all about, and once you know your system, you can teach it to someone else. Once they learn it, they can teach someone else, and then you can walk away, controlling only from the nucleus of your business (the central idea). I learned all of this from watching my mentor, and several unsolicited advice givers that I was able to pull small grains from.
Starting a business is actually learning to let go of control. Allowing that good ol’ faith you started with to power your mind and empower your employees, so that you can move forward and on to the next amazing idea!
