In high school, adults say to you, “enjoy your time in high school, the real world sucks.”
When you’re employed, you think that running your own business is where it’s at. That’s the ideal, “Oh, to be free!” you exclaim.
As a business owner now, I wish someone had told me to “enjoy my time employed because the real world of business ownership sucks.”
Business ownership is the bipolar disorder that you actually volunteer for. The high’s are oh-so-very-high and the low’s incredibly low. There is a manic depression that tells you that you’re in your own way but you cannot seem to get clear of the darkness. Then there are the incredible Cloud 9 experiences that have you convinced that you’ve got it fucking sorted. You’re all over this business management stuff like a rash on a bodyboarder’s chest. Except you aren’t. And, you never will be.
Business ownership takes a special type of mental and emotional strength in order to survive when things just aren’t going the way you have strategised, planned and implemented.
Every wave presents an opportunity to ride or get dumped under the crashing, swirling, reverb of Mother Nature’s ultimate cleanser. The salt water will clear your nose by punching you in the face.
And, just like getting dumped under a huge wave, sometimes you have to let yourself get tumbled about before you can sink to the bottom and find a way up again.
In my current state-of-mind, I’m aware of the crashing waves as they are pounding my spirit. I’m reminded that to breathe I don’t need my own air. That other’s can breathe life into me. I’m reminded that in order to get through this particular low that I have to reach out to those who know me best.
I’m also aware that if I’m standing in the way, then I need to get the fuck out of my own way and ask more questions to people who know more answers. No one knows everything, least of all, I.
The beauty in this humbling truth means that it’s impossible to drown.
To own a business is more than just the process of selling your services or products as a means of income. This is the employee’s mindset. No. When you own your own business, it becomes an identity that loans itself to your exact replica. Your business is all you are, you are all it is.
When they are one and the same, then, and only then, will it begin to suck less because you’ll be working daily towards the ultimate greatness of who you are.
What a gift these crashing waves give.
Your EQL Coach,
