Entrepreneurship & the Lies We Tell

Female Entrepreneur

Let me start by saying that, as an entrepreneur, I love that I get to choose what I do and when. I get to decide if something fits my life and my business and if it doesn’t. So that is why it is the best option for my family and me.

However, I do not want to perpetuate the fallacy that it is all unicorns and rainbows.

In fact, sometimes it flat-out sucks.

Sometimes I get so overwhelmed with the responsibility of being everything to my family and everything to my business that I feel like I have had my soul sucked out of me.

All of you who have seen Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban may remember the scene where Harry is getting attacked by the lake by Dementors. He is down, and we see the Dementors one by one as they suck his very life essence. When suddenly, a patronous appears in the form of a stag and rescues him.

That is me sometimes. Except all of my responsibilities are my Dementors, and I have no ability to create a patronous. While that may be a tad dramatic, that is the reality of days that feel heavy and too much.

The good news is they aren’t all like that. I have days that are the heavily marketed entrepreneurship versions of work days, working by the pool with a cocktail in hand, but I think it is just as important (if not more so) to talk about the parts that aren’t great.

I remember when I first started on this journey. The excitement. The drive. The vision. The expectations. It wasn’t long before every vision that I had of how “being my own boss” would be came crashing down.

I was overwhelmed.

Underpaid.

And heavily questioning whether I could pull this off.

I consumed anything I could get my hands on. Books. Videos. You name it. I followed all of the pros who had it all figured out. I studied them. I tried to follow what they did step by step, and still.. I kept falling flat on my face.

The more I looked at everyone else who had it figured out, the worse I felt about myself.

I fake quit while ugly crying about a thousand times.

I just didn’t understand what I was doing wrong.

They had so much success.

They looked so happy.

They had it all together (whatever that means).

While I was trying to keep my head above water, and felt like I was failing at everything. A seemingly great opportunity that ended up being a bad deal and costing me a lot of money. People that I trusted ended up being untrustworthy. Some really bad business deals. Look up Maria Daniels KYNC on Investor Hub if you are curious. (That is a long story of its own )

My professional life was crumbling, and at the same time, my personal life was too.

It didn’t do great things for me. It made me question everything. I questioned my worth. I questioned if I was even cut out for this. I focused on every negative that anyone had said to me and believed it. I sunk into a depression, and I almost gave up, all the while keeping a fake smile plastered on my face and sharing the highlight reels of my life.

I spiraled for a while until, one day, it all clicked. As I was scrolling through my social media page, I noticed the same theme.

I looked happy.

I looked excited.

You would never look at those pictures and guess everything I had been going through.

Sure, I had some wins even during my worst times that year…but there were far more bad days than good days. Where were those?

From someone else’s perspective, I was someone who looked like they had it all together. When in reality, that year had been one of the worst of my life.

Had my account been one that someone scrolled through while crying and doubting themselves? Had my pages been a place that made people feel inferior?

That made me realize that, as entrepreneurs, we have a responsibility. We have a responsibility to stop perpetuating the false reality that once you are your own boss, your fairytale has come true, and it is smooth sailing from there.

Sure, as entrepreneurs, we have the ability to literally dream and vision our goals and then take the time to make them a reality, and that is a gift.

But it is a gift that is wrapped in pretty paper and tied with a bow, and out of view, there are booby traps, and sick kids, and marriage problems, and bad business deals, and lots and lots of things that are the crappy part of this journey.

I don’t say that to turn anyone away from this journey. I would choose it again and again. However, like any journey, the journey into entrepreneurship is a journey that includes plenty of ups and downs. But that is what makes a journey worth it.

As seen on www.medium.com.