It’s been a long time since I’ve been outside of my comfort zone. Oh, there was that learning-to-juggle-thing I undertook around this time last year. It only took me a month to master that new trick. It wasn’t something I had ever tried before, so I didn’t expect to be good at it. The failures were anticipated and even a fun part of the journey.

 

Just the other day, my husband and I took a day off and went (snow) skiing, something I hadn’t done in 3 years. After a first clumsy run down the ‘bunny hill’ (the slow, easy slope for learners) my confidence re-emerged. I did hit the snow once (I swear there was an ice patch!), but that was OK, too. It had been a while, I was a little rusty, and I expected to fall a couple of times, anyway.

 

Now, in the midst of a new start-up business concept, I’m outside my comfort zone again but having a harder time with this one. It has been 14 years since I started my first company – back then things seemed different. Back then I had never run a business so I didn’t really know what to expect. I hadn’t gone through the extreme highs and lows of the roller-coaster-ride of entrepreneurship yet so it was all one unknown adventure. I had never worried about having enough cash to cover payroll or experienced the joy of depositing 6-figure checks from clients. I didn’t know what to expect around the next corner and its probably a good thing I didn’t. It was a blast.

 

 

Now, as I am kicking off a business concept I fully believe in and am extremely excited about, I find myself experiencing fleeting moments of trepidation, maybe even fear. It’s not that I’m afraid of failing – I do that all the time. A friend of mine even commented the other day on what she observed as a lack of fear in me.

 

She was wrong, however, to assume I am not fearful. My fear is not so much of failing…I think it is more a fear of SUCCEEDING. After all, over the past few years since cashing out of my first company I’ve gotten used to having a great deal of control around my time and energy. Having piloted through a start-up and navigated growth and expansion I know that time becomes less your own once you have customers and employees. Business #2 never got off the ground enough to compete for my time, but this one…I think there’s real possibility. I’ve got an awesome business partner and I feel we’re just in time to catch a wave as it is starting to roll (in an industry predicted to grow 72% this year!?).

 

The question that keeps coming up: will I be able to manage the time needed to grow the business and still be there for my daughters? Now that they’re in their teens what they need from me is very different from when they were younger. In some ways, I think they need me more now that they’re stretching their wings and starting to fly. Their ability to communicate, ask for help, and reach out when they need me has evolved, too. Thank goodness for text messaging and IM (did I really just write that?).

 

I will be able to do both. I will put time and space in my schedule for my family as they will always remain a priority, but I know it will be different than it has been over the past few years. Things will definitely change. I need to continue each day trying to figure out which balls in the air are glass so I don’t drop them and watch them shatter. Let the rubber ones bounce.

 

Are you or have you ever been afraid of success? Are you your own obstacle? What steps can you put into place to make sure you’re not the one holding you back?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 4th, 2009 at 10:41 am and is filed under Business Growth, Entrepreneurship, Work/Life Balance, business success secrets. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.