Inside the world of entrepreneurs

Numerous people wonder what it is like to be an entrepreneur. Many of these people might envy this kind of lifestyle. Some people want to become entrepreneurs and some daydream about becoming one. Although this kind of lifestyle gives you an impressive amount of freedom, be it financial or personal, there are also a lot of challenges to overcome. This lifestyle isn’t for everyone. It’s not that being an entrepreneur is some kind of an elite magical group, but their way of thinking is completely different from most people. 

In this article we will present some of the challenges an entrepreneur faces and the personality attributes that make a person an entrepreneur. If you’ve ever wondered what it is like to be inside the head of entrepreneurs, here you have it:

1. The parents 

The number one challenge for most entrepreneurs, especially when they are young, are the parents. Parents tend to discourage their kids to become self-employed or an entrepreneur, to an extent that is unfathomable. When someone is young, and when they are enthusiastically expressing their passion, parents tend to “bring them back on earth” as they say, but it’s rather bringing kids down to hell and a boring life that they decided to settle for. Our parents’ generation do not understand how the world works today. they want you to study for a “prestigious” profession because they think that this will give you financial security. They want you to find a safe job, with a salary coming every month, just in the name of security. Little do they know that times have changed; being a surgeon or a lawyer nowadays does not guarantee you becoming a millionaire. If ever you want to become an entrepreneur, you need to be ready that your parents are highly unlikely to support this passion. If you want to still be an entrepreneur you need to get over your parents’ approval. 

2. “Friends”

Most entrepreneurs do not have many friends, sometimes for the simple fact that they do not have enough time to invest in friendships. Entrepreneurs are busy investing their time elsewhere and they do not feel sorry to sacrifice “friendships” for the sake of their ambitions. However, entrepreneurs also face the challenge of being misunderstood or just not understood at all. Since most people have settled for the work, entertainment, sleep, gossip pattern, it is difficult for entrepreneurs to be able to relate to these topics. By the same token, it is just as difficult for other people to relate to entrepreneurs and their ideas. Most entrepreneurs will feel lonely in such surroundings, and these encounters will not prove to be satisfying. Entrepreneurs will usually have friends who have the same visions as them, so if you have friends who have chosen a completely different path from yours, and they do not understand your lifestyle choice(s), do not be afraid to let them go. Some “friends” will not support your ideals, nor your goals, just like your parents. Some friends might even discourage you to follow your dreams. Please don’t let these people affect your life decisions. Someone who is your true friend will support you even more than your parents do. 

This then brings us to the next point. 

3. Loneliness. 

If you’re afraid of the feeling of loneliness, being an entrepreneur isn’t for you. I suggest you then join the 98%, find a secure job, and spend your time gossiping instead of doing productive things. Granted you will not feel lonely if that is what you are into. There’s nothing wrong with living like the majority, but do not complain how you would like your life to be more exciting while you have chosen another lifestyle. 

Being an entrepreneur isn’t for everyone, just like becoming a doctor isn’t for everyone. 

It is indeed lonely at the top, but entrepreneurs do not fear the feeling of loneliness. They have other priorities, and they are happy with these. As stated above, entrepreneurs will feel lonely when there are unproductive or uninteresting conversations being held. Entrepreneurs will feel lonely when people talk about TV shows, or when they gossip about other people. 

4. Brain resilience

It takes ambition and resilience to become and stay an entrepreneur. It takes a lot of courage to not give a f*ck about other people’s opinions and to keep going for your dream no matter what. It also takes a strong brain to not panic when business plans aren’t always taking off the way they expected it to be. Some people might be mentally crushed by the challenges presented in this lifestyle. Some people get stressed and under the stress of this insecure lifestyle they might get depressed. The difference is that while for entrepreneurs stress and/or fear is a motivator, for other people stress/fear is a depressor. Entrepreneurs have fear, they feel fear (at least most of them) it is just that they keep going without being crushed by the feeling of fear, nor do they let this feeling stop them from achieving or trying to achieve their goals. Entrepreneurs are extremely independent. They are self-sufficient. Entrepreneurs respect other people’s time as well as boundaries. Having a lot of respect for time, they do not burden other people with phone calls or unnecessary texts. If they have emotional needs, they go see a professional, or they can bring it up when the time comes with some of their friends, but they don’t burden other people. 

5. Entrepreneurs are charismatics (even the a**hole ones).

By sticking to their goals, by believing in their dream despite challenges, entrepreneurs become confident in themselves and their ideas. The fact that they live a life full of freedom, with nobody telling them how to talk, how to dress or what to say, relaxes them. Consequently, unlike most people they’re less stuck up; they don’t walk on eggshells and feel free to make jokes. Entrepreneurs do not take life too seriously, nor do they take themselves too seriously. In fact, entrepreneurs tend to think less of themselves, because they are always interested in what would make other people happy. This is their purpose, this is their job; how can I satisfy people’s wants and needs and be happy at the same time. Actually money is a side effect of the first element, it’s rarely the only goal of an entrepreneur. By wanting to fulfil people’s desires and listening to them, it makes everyone fall under their spell. Entrepreneurs encourage people who have bigger dreams, they support everyone with a vision, even if it’s far-fetched. Entrepreneurs aren’t easily offended, au contraire, they have a great sense of humor, and the person they like to make the most fun of are themselves. People are forgiving even of entrepreneurs who show an a**hole attitude sometimes, because people admire their straightforwardness and confidence. 

6. Not all their undertakings will prove successful. 

If you think that everything that you work for is going to make you a millionaire, you have already failed at the way of thinking like an entrepreneur. If you give up because one of your projects didn’t end up as successfully as you hoped, you will not go far. There will be several failures before you find something you can thrive in. Entrepreneurs take failure fairly well; it might disappoint them that things didn’t turn out the way they wanted to, they learn on what they did wrong the first time. Even if a project turns out to be a failure, an entrepreneur will gain confidence out of it, for the simple fact that they had the balls to try it. There’s no such thing as failure in entrepreneurs because they always win. I was lucky enough to be in a relationship with a successful entrepreneur who taught me a lot of things. His way of thinking as well as his peers’ way of thinking was completely different from what I had seen in comparison to people around me, and these points are mentioned in this article : thanks Eric. 

7. Entrepreneurs do not get stuck on petty desires. 

The desires of entrepreneurs are different from other people’s as you might have realized by now.

They aren’t concerned with petty things such as wanting to please everyone. They aren’t concerned with what they say or how they come off. These are concerns of the mass population, and entrepreneurs have other things to take care of. Sometimes they don’t even care if they don’t have a relationship or sex. Their human desires lie elsewhere. 

When Elon Musk was single and talked about his dating life he said: 

“I would like to allocate more time to dating, though. I need to find a girlfriend. How much time does a woman want a week? Maybe 10 hours?"

He immediately thought of dating as a time investment, and that sometimes you will need to sacrifice time in order to date or to even be with a partner. 

Entrepreneurs do not need a holiday or any other source of entertainment. 

Entrepreneurs might want a holiday, but it is not a need for them. Even when they’re on holiday, they cannot switch off their brains and keep working on things anyway, no matter how little they might be. 

The question does not lie whether entrepreneurs want some things other humans want; yes they do want them. But they do not have the same needs other people have. They are capable to forego a lot of things other people aren’t able to forego. 

The most baffling difference is that entrepreneurs usually do not need an escape such as holidays, sex, or any other distraction, because they love the life they are living. Of course, this statement goes for entrepreneurs who are relatively healthy mentally and physically; there are entrepreneurs who are sex or drug addicts, and we hope they get the help they deserve, but this article isn’t about them. 

The final questions that most humans who aren’t entrepreneurs tend to ask is: are entrepreneurs workaholics? And is an entrepreneur life only about work?

Being a workaholic is when you use work in order to escape other problems in your life, while being an entrepreneur is about being excited to do what you’re doing. Are there entrepreneurs who are workaholic? Yes of course, nobody is immune to develop a work addiction, just like nobody is immune to develop any addiction for that matter. However, a relatively healthy entrepreneur loves what they do, they love their lifestyle, there is nothing in this world they would exchange for this lifestyle. Their life is not only about “work” because they do not see what they do as “work”. What some of you call work is a hobby and a play for the entrepreneur, they would be doing the same thing even if they were billionaires.