We are more than what we produce

Being ambitious my entire life I find myself getting wrapped up in what I produce or accomplish. I think a lot of entrepreneurs get in this trap. Right now I am in a building season and I am having a hard time not falling into a slump.

In business (and in life really) there are different seasons.  I have been running a successful business for 17 years and the ebbs and flows of the seasons are sometimes hard for me to take.

Right now I’m in a season of building.  new systems, new budgets, new enterprises.  Nothing right now is bringing hot and fast results.  Which is the fun, gratifying part!  We’re slow and steady, nose to the grindstone taking 2 steps forward and one step back.  This “building” season is hot off the heels of my business winning Business of the Year for 2018 from my city’s chamber of commerce…so the turtle slow grind of this season has got me in a slump.

I tend to be a thinker (not to be confused with an over-thinker).  While thinking about why I feel this way and why I’m in a slump, I have come up with questions.  Because that’s what thinkers do, right?  We think of more questions that we can’t actually answer.

Are the feelings we get from achieving just a temporary high until the next hurdle is crossed?  Like a quick dopamine hit?  Or, are we actually fulfilled because we finally feel or work is worthy?  That we are worthy?

What happens if our goals are never reached?  Is the journey enough to sustain us or will our self-worth be damaged because we didn’t produce?

I have my sights set on some pretty big goals, what happens if I never reach them? What if “it” never happens?  The thought of this makes me want to just close up shop, move somewhere remote and work for Target, aka my version of crawling into a hole.

The building season isn’t fun.  It’s expensive.  It’s grueling.  It pretty much sucks.  Especially for someone who may or may not have her own self-worth tied up in her production.

I feel like I have been in this season for a lifetime and there’s no light at the end of the tunnel.  But I keep going, relying on the hope, the belief that it will all be worth it.  I keep pushing and if you are in the grind and feeling the slump know you are not alone.

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