Let your balloon float away
Try to save the ice cream though.
The crests and the troughs; the highs and the lows. You hear a lot about them when you’re around creatives and entrepreneurs.
While you’re riding a crest, all is good with the world. The money is flowing in, the smiles are beaming, everything is working how it should.
Until you hit a trough, and your world takes a turn for the worse. Losses start to pile up, moods worsen, and nothing goes your way.
One minute you’re strolling along, ice cream in one hand, animal balloon in the other. The next, your elephant has learned how to fly and your ice cream is attracting ants on the floor.
Why? Why me?
Did I do something wrong? Did I get complacent? Did I run out of luck?
Doesn’t matter, you’re in a trough. The highs are over.
And you’re sad about that fact. You’re disheartened and dejected, unsure where to turn next. Unsure how to lift yourself out of this hole you now find yourself in.
You’re looking for that next crest. You’re searching far and wide for the next high without considering why you’ve hit a low in the first place.
You should be enjoying this.
Nothing teaches better than a trough, and not enough people understand that.
Sure, crests can be the result of hard work, determination and intelligent moves. But once you’re at the top the motivation to continue to learn and evolve will wither away.
It takes a trough to get you back in the learner’s state of mind.
It takes a trough to snap you out of your complacency, because there’s always complacency at the crest no matter how hard you try.
Some will concede defeat at the first sign of a trough. It’s why so many businesses fail so quickly.
Others — and these are the correct people — will roll with the punches, and work their asses off to get out of the trough. They’ll learn a lot, and when the next crest rolls around, their staying power at the top of that crest will be monumental.
Be one of the others.
Embrace every up and down.
Let your balloon float away.
