This morning, at like 6AM before I managed to actually get in bed, I decided I would start my Imperfect Entrepreneur "series," I guess you can call it a series, here on Steemit.
This is a series of posts that I'll be writing talking about my "adventures" as an online entrepreneur. I've been working online for about 10 years, but not on the same scale I'm going for now. I want to be able to reach more than just one small segment of people and have room to grow.
I'll get into my whole "story" in another post because for now, I wanna focus on what I hope to achieve with this.
Where is the Struggle?
I know a lot of people who work online and since I've made a shift into "the real world" there's one thing that really seems to be lacking.
You hear a lot of success stories but you never really hear about the struggles or failures. For some reason people don't seem to share that part of themselves.
In my previous circles, we're all typical artists. We all have a love/hate relationship with our own work but "omg that thing my friend just made is amazing. I hate you!!!"
We know we're not terrible, but we're not afraid to admit we could do better. Or even to share our process as we create. We're all on one small platform and we all go there to vent about how much we hate UVing or rigging skirts to character models.
We understand each other.
But when I stepped out of that bubble, I noticed that no one was talking about their struggles. Or if they were, there's just so much other stuff out there that no one ever sees it. There's no one single place where nearly every blogger or entrepreneur goes on the daily to share their stories.
Everyone's got their own blogs, and they're all writing about their success because that's what people want to know about. It's all "how I achieved x goal and you can too":
- How I made 30,000 in a single launch
- How I get 100,000 page views every month
- How I gained 10,000 Instagram followers
Worse yet, they all give the same generic advice. Which tbh, I'm not mad that they do. I probably never would have started my own tech/marketing blog otherwise. It's finally given me the opportunity to create something that I feel is useful.
Sure, some of that generic stuff is basic info that the newbie needs so I've got that too (or I will eventually). The real value in my blog is that people can learn how to take the next step, though.
Anyway, back to the point.I started to ask myself, "am I just not searching for the right thing? Are people really not sharing their failures?"
I thought maybe it was just me at first, but I've since seen a lot of people saying the same thing. Several that even encouraged me to go through with this series.
The Why
I remember watching one woman crying on a live stream while explaining how her life isn't the exact same thing she projects online.
I'll be honest, I didn't really understand this (I'm terrible with like... actual people-like feelings). Not everyone is perfect; I know that. But for some reason there's this pressure to pretend like it is.
As I watched this live stream I felt unnerved. Not because she was in tears, but because of what built up inside her that caused her to breakdown.
Why did she feel like sharing her hardships was such a huge deal?
Why was she thinking that sharing this part of her would cause any of us viewers to judge her?
That experience has really stuck with me. Along with other random things that have happened over the last few months, I decided to start writing about my struggles and failures as I progress with my business.
Representation is Important
I feel like this is something people really need to see. It's important to show people that everything isn't perfect.
Success isn't a straight line (and you bet your ass I'm pulling for success). It's falling down 50 times so you can finally stand up tall once.
You're not the only one who's pulling your hair out over a project.
You're not the only one barely making any sales.
You're not the only one who doesn't know how the fuck to use that one piece of technology (hello Steemit, I'm looking at you, though I do "get it" more than I did last week).
Success is a process and I hope you enjoy reading, watching, and listening to mine. If you'd like to keep up, please follow!
Share on Pinterest
If you liked this post, I'd really appreciate it if you shared the official pin on Pinterest.