Be Like Joey Tribbiani, Embrace The Fear

Entrepreneurship is awesome! Except of course when you start putting down a few numbers on paper. Suddenly, your steady income feels tough to attain. Depending on the type of business and how ‘new’ it may be, those numbers can get quickly depressing.

But, a solution seems to get you the best of both worlds. Why not try creating this idea you’re always thinking about while keeping your day job? This way you have the time to ramp up the revenues before getting on board full time.

This approach sadly doesn’t work. Joey explains this very well in an episode of friend:

The distinctions between being pulled to entrepreneurship and pushed to it are tremendous. People starting businesses in underdeveloped countries do it to survive. They get pushed to it. Chances are, you’re doing it for entirely different reasons.

By keeping your day job, you avoid the Fear and all the advantages that come with it: The Fear drives you to get results, to pivot if a version isn’t working and analyse your growth objectively.

The Fear can help you take decisions in weeks instead of months. But of course, your Chandler might force you to be more cautious. In this case, share your project with your friends. Ask them to help you enforce deadlines. Changing your initial idea is a step forward, it would be a shame to delay it without reason.

Originally published at antoine.finkelstein.fr.