5 Sad Truths (and Silver Linings) about Going into Business for Yourself
Sad Truth #1: Your Friends and Family Will Say They Support You. They Will Be Lying.
Unless your friends and family are a bunch of self-made entrepreneurs themselves, they won’t really get why you’re doing what you’re doing. Sure, they’ll say they’re proud of you and they may provide warm words of encouragement and support. But they will do this mostly because they love you. On the inside, they’ll silently wonder why you’re leaving that cushy corporate job, or whether you harbor some secret desire to end up living in a van down by the river.
The Silver Lining: You will meet new friends and ‘family’ that will support you as only those who have been where you’re trying to go can. Eventually you will end up getting reacquainted with a very special friend you might have ignored for a long while before you struck out on your own. That friend is called your inner voice. Sometimes, it will be the only friend you have. At other times, it will be the only friend you need.
Sad Truth #2: You Will Run Out of Money Long Before You Run Out of Great Ideas.
Entrepreneurs are typically great ‘idea people’, but many struggle with prioritizing those great ideas or really figuring out which ideas make sense to pursue. A lot of the ideas or pet projects you hatch up will seem like the best thing since sliced bread. They may make you feel warm and fuzzy, but will end up costing you loads of time and money, because they just don’t work.
The Silver Lining: You will quickly learn how to determine which great ideas are worth pursuing not only because they fulfill your passion or your ‘big why’, but also because they can provide a stable, continuing source of revenue for you, and fulfill a recurring need for your customers. In other words, you’ll start looking at your business with the eyes of an objective investor, instead of through the rose-colored glasses of the big dreamer.
Sad Truth #3: You Will Have Less Free Time Than Ever Before.
Those who think that working for yourself will free up your hectic schedule are deluded and will soon be disappointed to boot. As an independent business owner, you usually have to do the work of 3 or more people. But you still only get the same 24 hours each day to do it in. Occasionally, it will seem as if your life has turned into one long day of never ending to-do’s and to-meets and to-follow-up-ons. On the worst days, you’ll be so busy running around being master of the universe that you’ll totally forget to do the simple things. Like eating.
The Silver Lining: While you’ll have less free time as an independent professional, you will have way more flexibility with how you use your time than you ever could at a regular job. This means that while other folks are working a 9 to 5, you’ll get to run your errands, thereby avoiding traffic and long lines. You can stay up until 2am working if you want to, and schedule all your meetings after 10am. Occasionally, it will seem as though you’ve gained a supernatural ability to bend time to your will.
Sad Truth #4: You Are Alone. You Are Utterly Alone.
The one undeniable fact of being a solopreneur is that you are indeed working solo. If you’re an IT developer, that may be just the bliss you’ve always wished for. But even the most lone of the lone wolf worker types will eventually crave some human interaction. You may not think that you’ll miss that weird, overly chatty co-worker who always popped into your cube when you had an important deadline, but when the only voice you hear for days on end is your own, you’ll be pining for that guy like a long lost love.
The Silver Lining: That’s what laptops, wi-fi, coffee shops and co-working facilities were made for. When the isolation of working by yourself in your home office becomes too much to bear, head for that free or low-cost ‘office’ in your neighborhood. You get all the social benefits of being a cubicle dweller, with none of the nasty internal office politics. If you don’t want to risk blowing your budget on lattes, you can reach out to another solopreneur like yourself and offer to share home office space together once or twice a month. Then you can each take turns playing the weird, overly chatty one.
Sad Truth #5: Nothing Will Turn Out The Way You Originally Planned It.
There’s a saying that goes, “If you want to make God laugh, make plans”. Basically, all that means is that if you think you’ve figured out exactly what product or service is going to be your best seller, or exactly how long it’s going to take to get your website up and running, or how long it will be before you land that perfect client, you’re probably wrong. While that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t make plans for your business at all, it does mean that you shouldn’t cling to them like doctrine.
The Silver Lining: You will develop a high degree of adaptability, being able to respond to what your market is asking for, to what new trends are developing in your industry, and to sound advice from mentors and colleagues. You may even come to enjoy watching your plans work out totally differently than you expected them to. Because it means that the adventure of working for yourself will never grow old.
photo credit: stuck in customs
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Sage Small Business Solutions provides inexpensive infrastructure solutions for small and microbusinesses. If you're interested in improving your small business, or implementing techniques discussed in this article, find out how Sage can help.
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Hi there! I’m Kisha Solomon. I’m a writer, business advisor, and the owner of Sage Small Business Solutions.
This blog was created as a free resource for anyone who wants to increase their knowledge of how to own and manage a sustainable small business. New articles are posted once a week. You can sign up to get the blog via email, or you can also subscribe to new posts via RSS.
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As I read this, I felt like you had been peeping in my window or some magical way invaded my thoughts. This explains it exactly. Thanks for providing the silver linings.
Glad you liked it! I think we all share the same thoughts, just figured it’d be nice to also share the bright side of those truths that can sometimes get us indie biz owners down….