ENTREPRENEURSHIP IS a beautiful thing. It can give you anything you want from life. For me, the decision to become an entrepreneur was all about freedom. I wanted to have the freedom to do whatever I want, whenever I want to. And now that I’m running a successful digital design and marketing agency, I can finally do that.
But make no mistake, entrepreneurship is difficult. Not a day goes by where I don’t face a challenge, and the same will be true for you too. You will face a lot of hardship and will have to make a lot of tough decisions.
With this article, I hope to prepare you for what lies ahead. As Rolf Hochhuth—a German author and playwright known for his dramas in the 60s and 70s—said, “Only the foolish learn from experience. The wise learn from the experience of others.”
The Life of Being an Entrepreneur Is Hard Because of These Things
I have encountered the following challenges repeatedly, and you will too, should you decide to embark on your entrepreneurial journey. Perhaps you’re already running a successful business, and you can relate.
1. Your friends want you to do well, but not better than them.
This is a harsh realization I had early on in my journey. Excited to share the news of having started my own company, some of my friends—who were supportive of my every decision up to that point—showed their envy toward me. Some eventually even turned their back to me.
Having processed these situations, I now understand that these were friends who were stuck in a day job they despised, working their lives away. A lot of things in their life weren’t going well.
The lesson I learned is that people want you to do well, but not better than them. This is true even for your closest friends and family, which makes it a tough pill to swallow for first-time entrepreneurs.
Related: 5 Powerful Ways to Muster Up the Courage to Start Your Own Business (3 min. read)
2. There are a lot of things to focus on.
There are a million things you can do at any given moment. Your list of action items might be several pages long and full of new ideas, so if you don’t have a solid prioritization system in place, your business will grow slowly, or even worse, it might not grow at all.
Knowing how to focus on items that move the needle is perhaps the most important skill you can have in entrepreneurship. Why? Because it will move you in the right direction, guaranteed.
In Sell Like Crazy, a book by Sabri Suby on how you can improve your ability to sell, amongst other things, there’s a quote that further explains why you should focus your efforts on tasks that produce results. “You shouldn’t invest your time in boring, low-value tasks. Because every minute you spend on low-value tasks or putting out fires is time taken away from the areas of your business that have the most leverage and the largest potential to make you money.”
Related: Why Getting Ahead in Life is Hard and What You Can Do About It (4 min. read)
3. People will always find something to criticize you for.
Whenever I would share positive news with people, such as landing a new client or paying for a vacation with hard-earned money, I didn’t get the responses I expected.
Rather than being genuinely happy for you, people will pick apart what you’re saying until they find something to criticize. They latch onto weak points in a subconscious effort to take you down, so they don’t have to feel bad about their situation.
Related: In Business, What Feels Like the End is Often the Beginning (5 min. read)
How to Make Your Life as an Entrepreneur Less Hard
There are many things you can do to help you overcome challenges in your business.
Besides just putting in a lot of hard work, you want to work smart and tackle tasks that have a positive impact. Look at the bigger picture when reviewing your list of tasks, and ask yourself, “What’s the most important action I can take right now to move the needle?”
When you’re not working hard and smart, you’ll find that some people in your life can be distracting (especially when they’re envious of your courageous decision to have started your own business). Surround yourself with people who think like you and have similar goals. Only spend time with people who will help you develop into the person you want to be.
Related: Working Your Life Away? Entrepreneurship May Be Your Way Out (5 min. read)
Some Great Books on This Topic
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Sell Like Crazy
by Sabri Suby
How to Talk to Anyone
by James W. Williams