Ode to Entrepreneurs

Why do employees become entrepreneurs? Do we really lust after the dangers, snares and red tape? Perhaps we are thrill seekers who love the potential risks and frustrations that come with it.

Is it really about freedom and a lust for control as many men have craved? Possibly for some… Perhaps some would never feel like they’ve truly lived had they not fought for their dreams at least once. Maybe some need to prove it to themselves or some dad who yelled and called them a “moron” or some doctor who labeled them “slow”.

Perhaps there’s some internal desire to beat someone else, to do better, or a greed that’s all consuming that they can’t stop within themselves. Perhaps that greed tells them $3k a month is for losers, and that $5k a month isn’t good enough and that even $10k a month isn’t what legends are made from.

What if it’s beautiful.

In the face of it all, there’s a chance to create. To inspire and uplift. The canvas is blank. The cheques are unprinted and their colors and paper type unselected. Perhaps the logo is un-chiseled from the fresh clay of the artist’s fingertips. The color scheme of the website and the content never written. Perhaps a true story teller could never work for someone else, telling stories within a box of rules and set guidelines for their story.

Is that fair of the universe to limit artists and their work to the brush stroke’s of an employer who really has no interest in allowing freedom of expression. Indeed, an entrepreneur is truly discovered when he realizes that building someone else’s dream (not just bank account) was never part of his chemistry.

My clients are many canvases. Each client has a certain type of hair protruding from it’s brush. A certain thickness and sensitivity to the canvas as it graces the surface of the newly created painting. Each client comes with many glorious colors that could be crafted into a new work of art. New automation, new systems, new feelings to inspire in the hearts and minds of thier customers.

To work for just one client would mean limiting my choice of colors, emotions, designs and flavours. It would be a lifetime of macaroni and cheese with no choice of alternate pastas.

There’d be a limit to my skills growth, my experiences and certainly my income growth. Who wants those kinds of limits on the tapestries of life? A grey canvas for the rest of your life, or a red one? A life devoid of choices and flavours brilliantly blending in and out of each other would surely be a waste. Indeed, the life of an entrepreneur is the best kind, problems and all.