This blog post is dedicated to RW and written to invoke thought, not provide you with the skills and attributes needed to be an Entrepreneur. There are hundreds of articles out there to provide you with the “know-how”. I am exploring the “why-how”.
My life:
3 yrs ~ Montessori school, fun learning of the basics.
4 yrs ~ Primary School, initially fun to evolve into evening homework, mandatory sports, trips to the Headmaster’s office and mandatory conforming to the rules of the school.
12 yrs ~ Secondary School, more mandatory subjects, mandatory sports, mandatory extra-curricular activities, optional extra subjects (instead of playtime), mandatory career guidance (I won’t bore you with the obvious advice from a religious convent.)
17 yrs ~ Third Level, optional everything. Chaos!
20 yrs ~ Out on my ear. Get a job.
24 yrs ~ I opt out. Sound familiar?
Two decades of being inside numerous education systems. I finally came to the conclusion, the working life I had been groomed for, did not suit me. I may have also thought I did not suit this working life. My instincts told me that I would make money in my life, but not the way I was conditioned to. Where do I turn for guidance? When every person I knew was conditioning me to “get a job”.
24 yrs~ Enter a boy (I was wise enough to eventually marry him.) Within 3 months of meeting this boy, I was on a trip of a lifetime, travelling the world, which lasted five years.
29 yrs~ Return home. I had figured out what an Entrepreneur is. I spent 5 years working and living in the most extreme places, essentially self-employed. I learned that self-employment required certain skills, abilities and knowledge; but most of all – ATTITUDE (mindset).
Unfortunately, I had to undo two decades of conditioning, but fortunately I had also acquired the life skills during these two decades to prepare me for independence (smoking behind the bicycle shed at school), documented earning power (qualifications), and entrepreneurism (running school tuck shop, magazine and bank). Yet, at 29, I still sought “to get a job”. My conditioning provided enough self-doubt and red ears to ignore my heart.
I met Yanky Fachler last week. We discussed the mindset of an entrepreneur and the system we grow up in and are educated in. Yanky recently updated and released one of his books “Fire in the Belly”. It’s worth a read, as it deals with the mindset behind “getting off the ladder” (becoming self-employed.) It is not an easy task, by any standards, but if I had to say only one thing… if you have a dream, the energy, the fire , to create something and make money from it – do it! All the rest of the skills, knowledge and ability can be learned.
32 yrs ~ I used my new attitude and gave up smoking!
If you are not a risk taker, stay “on the ladder”. The ATTITUDE part begins with Courage. Courage is hard to learn, but possible. We become courageous when we assert ourselves as Entrepreneurs. We become courageous when we believe in ourselves. We become more courageous when we allow ourselves to live the dream.
How has courage driven you to start your own business? Please share with us below.
