How are you doing at running your own business?

Did you know that over 50% of businesses fail within the first four years?

Now, I’m not a huge fan of the word “fail” if I’m being honest with you. I think everything we experience is a learning opportunity, whether it worked or not.

BUT… how do you beat that stat? How do you say “F You” to failure and guarantee to yourself and others that you’ll make it at running your own business?

There are a lot of people out there promising a fool-proof method, secret strategy, and must-have products that will take you to the next level. The truth is: when we actually stop to LOOK at entrepreneurs who have “made it”, who have reached a level of success that we are currently only dreaming about… they all have three things in common:

Resilience (and patience)

They know what they want and they aren’t taking no for an answer. Clarity around your vision and the ability to allow that vision to grow even beyond your own wildest dreams guarantees that you or your fear won’t get in the way. And instead of letting supposed rejection and failure stop you, you let it fuel you forward.

Action Items:

• Get clear on the vision of how you want to be running your own business
• Start a daily mindset practice that helps build trust and reaffirm your vision on a daily basis
• Create a vision board that you see on a regular basis (mine is the background on my phone) to always remind yourself why you’re doing what you’re doing

Community and support

When you feel stuck, overwhelmed or excited, it can feel like you have nowhere to go to talk to about it. Sure, our families and friends love us, but they don’t really understand and there are only so many “Maybe you should get a real job then” or “That’s great! Now just keep it going…” that we can take. Instead, accept that they don’t get it, love them anyway, and find a group of people to surround yourself with that you don’t feel ashamed to brag to (or freak out to). When you don’t think you can keep going, they’ll be there to promise you that you can. Moreover, they’ll lend helping hands and lift you up and forward.

Action Items:

• Join an engaged, supportive and safe space where you don’t have to sell or be sold to, fake it until you make it, and can share your honest struggles, frustrations, celebrations and more.
• Commit to one local networking event a month if you have access to them. Get yourself out there and meet local entrepreneurs that can keep you accountable and push you to the next level.

The ability to take action

The mindset stuff is all well and good. So is the community and support. They’re all very important ingredients. But if you don’t have the ability to overcome your fears, stop the obsessive planning and actually take action, nothing is going to get done. This is practically impossible when you have to Google how to do literally everything.  What you know should only take 30 minutes ends up taking 3 hours because there’s just too. much. information. out. there. 

Action Items: 

• Find a handful of trusted resources and ignore the rest. Make sure they’re high quality, gives you the answers you need and the tools to implement them. If you’re looking for a one-stop-shop that brings the experts together and the tools you’ll be working right away, while running your own business.
• Build a distraction-proof action plan that keeps you making big moves every day towards your strategic vision.

And that’s it. Resilience, support and the ability to make real moves are all it takes. There are always going to be people out there that are better than you at what you do, more connected, more financially able… but when they quit and you keep going, guess who will come out on top.