By now, our 3 key points to success in work and life, should have become your daily mantra:
- Knowing that success is a journey.
- Fear will hold you back, but faith will keep you going.
- Purposeful action is essential.
So, let’s take a look at the 3rd question that we need to ask ourselves when starting a new business.
What fears do I have about owning a business?
Running any new business is always going to be a risk and leaving your job to run your own business is a huge step in life.
As with anything that brings a lot of pressure, our fears and worries about the future are often the biggest hurdle that we need to get over before we can move forward.
However, that’s not to say that we shouldn’t have fears or worries and acknowledging your fear is an important part of the process. Asking yourself what parts of running your own business worries you and then answering those fears with solutions, allows you to take control of the situation.
Common fears about running a business can be:
What if I don’t make enough money?
How will I afford to pay the bills whilst starting up?
How will I get clients/customers?
What if I fail?
A satisfying task I would like you to do this week is to write down your fears, however small or insignificant they may seem to you, there is no such thing as an unwarranted fear. Once you have your list of fears, you need to write the solution right next to it. An example would be:
How will I afford to pay the bills whilst starting up? I have invested in a savings account/pot that will cover any slow months during the start up of my business.
Repeat this for every fear or worry that you have.
How will I get clients or customers? I know my target audience and have researched marketing strategies that will target this market.
By completing this, you are reinforcing the idea that to every problem, there is a solution. This in turn will give you faith in both yourself and your business idea and allow you to move forward- Fear will hold you back, but Faith will keep you going.
Remember, you made a decision to start this business as you believe in your product or service. Go back to question one and remind yourself of why you are doing this. Don’t let fear become the reason you didn’t achieve your goals.
Following on from Fear, next week will take a look at question number 4- Do I understand my business risks?