A Pinterest Mood Board Won’t Build it For You.

A business lesson the internet does not want you to know. Is this some cheesy “insider secrets they won’t tell you” headline, perhaps. I just believe every now and then we need to remove the cloak of romanticism off of the business owning life and talk about how things really go.

I titled this post “a pinterest mood board won’t build it for you” because entrepreneurs in the virtual online world have convinced no small amount of people that everything about being a self starter is “cute”. Just start an email list, build a beautiful website, have a brand package, and listen to “strategy” podcasts and you’ll wake up to money flying out of your air vents.

Having a business has to have some initial appeal thought right? For some, it is determining your own hours (which is kind of true and kind of not). What they do not tell you is that instead of having 8 hours of your day, determined by a company that you are employed by, it is 13 hours of your day determined by your own company that you never actually go home from. You have to know which of these your personality type would work best in.

You have to be willing to put in immense amounts of hours that nobody sees and that you do not get paid for. And no, these late night hours are not always “messy buns, iced coffees, laptops, fuzzy socks, and a cute planner”. Sometimes, your main machine will go down, you will be on hold with companies that are responsible for shipping your serving product, you will drive 8 hours for a new generator at 4am, the list goes on.

You must be content not always getting the results you planned on. You must be okay losing customers. You have to remain confident after seeing bad reviews published online. You have to choose to live far below your means to give your company the means to grow.

I don’t write any of this to try and scare anyone off from starting a business, I write this to let everyone who is struggling with business know that they aren’t some incapable anomaly. Self starting is hard, wonderful, empowering, and beyond stressful. When you are doing what you are meant to be, even the hardest times will be worth it, you might wish for a normal job, or a boss to hand off your struggles to.

I could rant for hours about the insanity of day to day functions, but I could also sit and talk for hours about the amazing and overwhelmingly positive encounters we have with our customers on a daily basis. Your lows might shove you through the floor, but when someone loves something you created and your shop is their 7 minutes to get away from the world and treat themselves, there is no better feeling.

I have spent about 2 hours trying to figure out how to tie all this up into a little bow of hopefulness and encouragement. Instead of continuing to ramble on about the back and forth nature of business, I will just tell you to choose courage over comfort, to not let the voice of “what if” win, and to allow the assuredness you have within you lead to success.

Okay NOWWW I’m done rambling.

-Annalisa