In yesterday’s post, Gary Novosel of The Food Medic gave the advice that all entrepreneurs should write down all the fears about starting their own business, and then put them aside. I really took his advice to heart as I have a lot of fears about starting my own business. As I reviewed my list I realized that it’s longer than I thought it was and that there are probably a lot of people who share the same fears.
To overcome fears we have to look our fears in the face and not blink. I really want to start my own venture, and the best way to answer these fears is to write them out and then write a remedy for each of them. Since these thoughts may be helpful to readers who are also interested in starting their own businesses, I wanted to write them as a series on this blog with the hope that I can replace fear with hope:
Fear #1: “I won’t make enough money.”
Start small and grow slowly. Whenever we begin something, we naturally wish for success in a big way. What seems more sustainable to me, and will likely generate more happiness, is a steady flame rather than a flash in the pan.
If we can keep a steady job while starting our own business on the side with our free time, that releases some financial fears. The trick is to be present at a job when we’re there, and present working on our business in our own time. I hear from a lot of entrepreneurs that they are frustrated that they can’t spend all their time on their business because they have to keep a day job. Finding a few nuggets of our job that inform our own business idea eases that frustration.
My friend, Dave, is interested in a portfolio approach to his career – a lot of different ventures that each earn a small amount of money and keep him interested and engaged. Entrepreneurs place a lot of pressure on themselves to earn all their income from a single business idea. That might work, or we might find that we’re happy earning a portion of our total income from a business venture, at least in the beginning.
Concern about earning enough money from my business laid to rest. Fear #2 for tomorrow: “No one will want the product or service my business produces.”
Christa Avampato 