Entrepreneurial Guilt

We’ve all been there….laying awake at night chastising ourselves for what we didn’t get done that day. Or maybe it shows up at 5am, jolting you awake with a panic about everything you should have done differently the day before. Many of us entrepreneurs by nature our overachievers, neurodivergent, recovering perfectionists, workaholics or some combination. Being in our minds is not always the most fun place to be.

I had to forcefully stop the negative thoughts in their tracks this morning and write this blog post instead because I was going down the beating-myself-up-for-nothing path. Why didn’t I capture the video properly for the speaker last night? Why didn’t I put a QR code up on the screen so everyone would click to our new Asheville women entrepreneurs calendar? Why did I get a group picture of my co-host and our first guest for our very first podcast episode for Women in Trades Hub? Why is my desk still not fully setup properly? Why didn’t I make sure to talk to that person who I wanted to connect with?

But then, I breathed deep and hard a few times, shook it off, and started typing. I have to cling very hard to the Power of One philosophy when it comes to entrepreneurship that I learned years ago from the great media mastermind Gary Vaynerchuk. He was having an assistant capture content all day long way before there was TikTok and influencers and everyone was making videos. I remind myself that even if ONE GOOD THING happened yesterday to propel my businesses and life forward, that is enough. Did I do everything perfectly? Heck no! But I am in the midst of a huge growth period in my professional life, I have to stay focused on the positives or I will do down the despair rabbit hole, and nothing good is down there. Trust me, I have traveled down it far too many times.

So when you’re feeling like you’re not doing enough, not successful enough, not making enough money…. try to focus on the ONE BEST THING that happened in your business yesterday, and leave it at that. Today is a new day with a new ONE BEST THING just waiting for me to happen. Maybe this blog post will be it since it staved off a boatload of negativity that was trying to consume my day, but I also like the idea of going through the rest of the day waiting to see what might be my ONE BEST THING today. And guess what? When you train your mind to look out for the wins instead of the losses, you’ll start seeing a lot more wins than one.