Lately I feel kinda stuck with my project.
At the begining I was super motivated. Working late, waking up early, thinking “ok this is it”. I really believed it was gonna work.
Now some days I work a lot and feel like I did nothing. Other days I dont even want to open my laptop. People keep saying “just be disciplined” but they dont talk about the mental side.
Being on your own mess with your head. You doubt everything. You compare yourself too much. You wonder if you’re building something or just losing time.
I’m not quitting. Just being honest.
If you’re an entrepreneur, how do you deal with those low motivation phases ?
Entrepreneurship is way harder mentally than I expected
byu/toujourspluss inEntrepreneur
Posted by toujourspluss
9 Comments
Therapy helps me a lot
You’re not alone. This mental whiplash is probably the hardest part of doing this solo. Some days feel productive, others feel pointless, even when you worked. I’ve learned that doubt doesn’t mean failure, it usually means you’re in the middle. Hang in there.
For me it’s not about motivation anymore. Motivation fades, discipline stays.
Doing small things every day is what really matters. Using BeeDone helped me build that discipline, even on bad days.
That’s what changed the game for me.
I’ve felt this too. Honestly, more than once.
For me it wasn’t really about discipline, it was about not knowing if what I was doing actually mattered. When that doubt creeps in, motivation just disappears.
On days like that I don’t try to “push through”. I just pick one tiny thing I can finish, even if it feels stupidly small, and then I stop.
Also, the comparison part is brutal. Everyone looks confident from the outside, but most people are way more unsure than they admit.
You’re definitely not alone in feeling this.
The journey is brutal. Accept it, and let the end goal keep you moving!
Trying to be always on doesn’t work. Have backup and make sure you are executing a plan that you can take a break from and get to later. If you know your product, customers, operations, and plan then there should be very little fear and overwork.
Andy Frisella has a power list system of doing just 5 things; action items each day. I started doing this in early 2017. My list usually is mostly business but some days there’s family and personal items in that five.
I write it down in a note book every night. Then, at the end of each day, I write win or loss. If you win enough days, you win the week. If you win enough weeks, you win the month.
It also gives me a journal of action items that I can go back and look at over the years. If I don’t hit a quarterly goal or if a habit doesn’t change in my personal life. I can take a look and see what I did each day in that time period.
Another aspect of building a business, they’re people don’t talk about is how easy it is to lie to ourselves. We try to make ourselves believe that busy is productive. Are you really moving the needle though?
It’s the easiest form of discipline building i’ve ever implemented. Now there have been some dark nights of the soul so to speak throughout the last ten years. Where I don’t wanna do anything. In those moments on those days I make myself get up and do something very uncomfortable.
A couple weeks ago, we had a cold front come through Texas. Nothing major but colder than what we’re used to. I live in a rural area, surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of acres. I think it said thirty five mile an hour winds that day but our wind gauge was hitting fifty plus. It was miserable outside.
I’d made myself get up at 6:30 in the morning, because I usually sleep until I wake up naturally. I got dressed quickly, and I went out to the horses barn/shed. And got his bucket and I hiked back to the shop to fill it with feed and let it soak with warm water. I made myself stand outside in the cold wind for that ten minutes. Then, I hiked back out through multiple gates that I had to unlock and lock. Disengaging and reengaging electric fences. Gave the beast his bucket. When I hiked back through the gates and went inside. All in all, it took about thirty minutes.And I was cold.
I jumped in a hot shower.Got dressed again for the day. Grabbed my backpack with my business stuff in it and I headed to my office. I didn’t feel better but I was moving. I started into my list which I had purposely made very easy for the day. Knocked it out within about two hours.
When you’re done with your five things, you’re done for the day. Myself included everyone always says, oh I can do twelve things or thirty things. Just do the fucking five things.
I finished my five things and I went to sit on the couch in my office and just scroll the internet. Then, my phone rang with a new customer. Then, another, and another, and another, and another. Turns out, one of our competitors was bought out, and the new company’s prices went up another thirty percent. I have no employees.I handle everything for my company and it’s quite large. When a new customer contacts us, though I have to do all the onboarding, enter their order set up the financials and the emails and then pick their order pack their order and ship their order all before three p m.
I was not in the mood or the mind state.To do this shit. I was done for the day.
Now i’ve switched into a different phase, which is called test days…. Another Andy Frisella process. This is where your discipline kicks in. I knocked out all the orders on time.And then I went back to the office to tally up the financial. $17,356 in new sales in one day. That was a record.My previous record was $13k. Each one of these customers will re order every single month forever. I had just had the best day. I’d had in business in a long time and it was one of the worst days for me mentally.
If I had not of woken up early and done the horse feeding before forcing myself to the office to knock out my powerlist, it would have been too late in the day for me to accomplish all three things.
That leads me to another belief that I personally have, is that I have a path. I’m on my path and as long as I stay on my path, things will work out.
Those test days are The Times that you look back on for brief encouragement when you need it to reinforce your discipline.
Know this though, when you become successful, even though you’re still dealing with this type of shit, weekly, people are gonna tell you that you must have gotten lucky to be as successful as you are.
This happens to everyone. You just have to remember, you’re the MOST Wrong Right before you’re RIGHT.
You can literally make no progress 364 days of the year. And then that 1 single day, hit that shit out the ball park.
Life works in mysterious ways, and 1 thing can literally change your Life around.
And above all, just have FUN with it!! It wasn’t until then, that I saw success. Cheers.
I’m at that stage as well and it sucks so bad. I think I’ve got a good product but it’s a brutal slog.