The Dark Night
Entrepreneur, My Journey: Episode 4
(Episode 1: Time to Cast Off; Episode 2: Taking the Plunge; Episode 3: Christopher Columbus)
I am now in business. I have a company, a small office, a website, a service offering, some marketing materials and great hopes. My plan is to get my first clients by tapping into my large network, made of business contacts from a variety of industries and former clients. I have invested all my career in my professional network while I was working for a Big4 firm. I have a solid contact and prospect database. I am confident in my plan. Even if it doesn’t work as planned, it will lead me somewhere. That’s where I’m going.
Fight or Flight Response
I am very conscious that nothing happens by chance. You create your own luck. From day one, I deployed huge amounts of energy in my new venture. Once again I went out and met a lot of people. Old contacts, recent contacts, new ones. Breakfast, coffee, lunch, drinks. For weeks. Non-stop meetings. Calls. Emails. I wrote Thought Leadership pieces to push on Linkedin. I visited a lot of former clients to present my business and services. I also spoke to many ex-colleagues who had moved to great new jobs. Non-stop hustling.
The stress was high. The anxiety was deep. Because for the first time in my professional life, my time was limited. If I didn’t start delivering client engagements soon, I was going to run out of cash and face financial difficulties. Paying the bills, the mortgage, the usual outgoings, etc. I had a few months of savings, took a business loan, and was full of energy.
What was happening exactly? I was scared to my bones. Very simple. It was the Fight or Flight response. Survival instinct was kicking in. The real possibility of becoming financially broke started to eat me alive. High stress caused by the new situation of being an entrepreneur forced me to dig deep into everything I had, mentally and physically. It became a fight. A real fight for survival. Where both mental and physical strength count.
I quickly understood that if I didn’t look after myself, mentally and physically, I would never succeed. It’s not a sprint, it’s not a marathon, it’s not a battle, it’s a war against the adversity of life.
Mens Sana In Corpore Sano
“A healthy mind in a healthy body”. Nobody had to tell me about this. I knew that this very basic concept was part of any future success.
I turned to my entrepreneur friends for their business advice. I reconnected with ex-bosses to gather their market views and thoughts. I was also very lucky to find mentors in my network. Many people were keen to “help me succeed”. To bring me honest feedback when necessary: the good, the bad and the ugly. It’s also important to note that some friends had nothing to say or were not willing to help at all. They took it as if I had moved to another firm for another role. Business as usual. Nothing special. They had zero interest in discussing my “new life”. Fine. I never took it personally. I can understand. We all have hardships, difficult personal situations, hard jobs, etc. That’s life.
I also read a ton of articles on Medium about “entrepreneurship”, “self-help”, “self-improvement”, “meditation”, “marketing”, “sales”, etc.
“We are built for struggle, us human beings. We are built to contend with the world. You want a challenge because a challenge fortifies you. You might fail. People have extracted unbelievable success from catastrophic failures.”
I bought lots of business books as well. I read Steve Jobs biography, I read Ray Dalio, and others. I was not looking for role models or magic recipes. I was simply feeding my hunger for knowledge coming from experience. The non-scientific knowledge of humans who went from one point to another, and learned something along the way.
Life is too short to read only business books and self-improvement articles on Medium. So I also turned to my own intellectual world when I could, during week-ends and evenings. Watching great or bad films. Reading books about Roman archeology or current affairs, economy and politics. Whatever I felt like reading or watching.
My point is: it was necessary to feed my mind with intellectual fuel coming from a variety of sources. It was a requirement to keep my mind sane, strong, agile, happy, resilient, during this life-changing experience.
Of course I made time to go to the gym 3 times a week. I also went to my local Barry’s Bootcamp once or twice during the week-end. I went for walks. I also started cooking sometimes to force my mind to focus on something disconnected from my day-to-day business. I tried to monitor my social and business drinking. Because falling into the trap of addiction can be tempting during hard psychological times. I tried to make sure I had enough good sleep to keep functioning at high regime. I am also lucky to have a great family who has been an incredible support for me so far.
Failure is not an option
After 2 months, I got my first work engagement. The first one! I was hired by a publicly listed European company. It was not a huge project. But it was the first one. It was not going to cover my expenses and investments so far, but it was a start. I delivered the job. The client was happy. I was paid. And then, nothing. No more jobs coming through the door. More hustling. More activity. More marketing, more thought leadership, more everything. Still nothing. No new client work.
I was going through the night. On my own. I thought I would get a job, see light at the end of the tunnel, but no. Nothing came. Still the dark night. Once again I kept thinking about Christopher Columbus (episode 3). This guy who thought he was going somewhere (the Indies) but had no idea he actually wasn’t. At some point him and his crew were in the middle of the Atlantic. Clean water and decent food were running out on the vessels. Mutiny was a constant threat. Crew members were dying of disease. At some point it was clear to everyone that something about Christopher Columbus’ calculations was deeply wrong. They were all going to die in the middle of the sea. This crazy venture was a massive failure in the making.
That’s how I felt. I had now sailed far away from the coast of financial comfort of employe’s life. I was now on my own in the high seas. I was too far to give up. And I had no idea what lied ahead. I was lost at sea.
This moment was real. It was terrifying. Fear was in every cell of my body. This is when I tested live my ability to manage adversity in life. Stay calm. Don’t panic. Easy to say of course.
As bizarre and cheesy as it may sound, after the story of Christopher Columbus failing to reach its original destination, the lyrics from Eminem — Loose yourself — kept bouncing back in my head:
“You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow”
“This opportunity comes once in a lifetime”
“Success is my only motherfuckin’ option — failure’s not”
Failure is not an option. This became my personal motto during this difficult moment. Using this Eminem song from my twenties, I was basically shouting to myself:
“You can’t give up. Trust your efforts. Build resilience. Work more. Hustle more. Results, good or bad, will follow. But you can’t give up”.
Read the next story, Episode 5: Deep Breath. No End in Sight
Entrepreneur, My Journey
Episode 1: Time to Cast Off
Episode 2: Taking the Plunge
Episode 3: Christopher Columbus
Episode 4: The Dark Night
Episode 5: Deep Breath. No End in Sight
Episode 6: Go alone, go fast. Go with others, go far.
Thank you for reading. I just want to share my journey as an entrepreneur as my story may help someone who is going through a professional life crisis or who simply has questions about what to do next. I have always fed on stories from others to help me in life. I hope I can help someone with my story.
Jason
