Thank you so much for joining us today.  I’m going to share a personal story with you and the lessons learned from my recent journey. I share this because I have always believed in planning, in being proactive and having a back-up plan. But sometimes life gets in the way and the overwhelm from everything can create a sinking ship. I’m not looking for any sympathy from todays episode, just sharing to hopefully help you think a little differently about the realities of being a business owner.

For those of you that have started a business, you know that being a business owner is hard work, particularly if you are a solo. For many, it means 18 hour days, financial stress, emotional highs and lows all for the ability to follow a dream, to be the boss and determine your own destiny.  It can also be very lonely. Your friends and family don’t always understand what you are doing and why you need to put in so many hours.  They don’t always understand the worries you have of closing the sale, how you’ll pay yourself or if the customer is unhappy with something how you are going to make it right and still make money.

People go into business for different reasons and people want different things out of having a business. It's a personal choice and while I do a lot of consulting in this area I see so many people struggle to make it work. Today I’m going to share some personal experiences and the lessons learned to hopefully help you the business owner.
It's Lonely At The Top
I frequently say ‘ it’s lonely at the top’ and it’s something that I’ve heard many people say as well as I’ve experienced it myself.  When I started my first business, my husband at the time thought that meant I’d be home more, have more time for him and more time to do things around the house so he could do less. Unfortunately, he didn’t understand I needed to be out meeting people during the day and doing the work at night. He didn’t understand it took money to get things rolling, he thought I should should be contributing financially to the household sooner than I did.  When I need to work weekends now, my friends don’t understand why I can’t join them for a fun girls night out. One of my friends recently asked me why I travel so much, not understanding that it is all business! (ok, a few trips are to see family).

What becomes a bigger challenge for businessowners is when life gets in the way. One of my clients recently had a fire in his studio, then his landlord sent a letter non renewing his lease, a few months later he lost his dad, then his wife was diagnosed with cancer and his biggest clients went out of business. All of this took place over the course of 12 months. He hadn’t planned for any of this. He’s definitely feeling overwhelmed because it is a lot to process at one time. Having one of these issues is enough to deal with but to be hit with one after another becomes too much.

Then there is the caregiving issue. For men, this isn’t usually as relevant because often they have a woman in their life to handle these issues. Please note that I said usually and I might be stereotyping a little. But as a general rule, women are the caregivers. When a woman starts a business it is often done around the family. If the kids need afternoon carpool, mom stops working to make it happen. If the aging parents need care, it's usually the daughter that responds.
The Sandwich Generation
What happens when a lot of people need the business owner at one time? It's called the sandwich generation - a time when someone is raising children and caring for parents or seniors at the same time. Children alone can gobble up all of your time, but add parents to the mix and it doesn’t take much for everything to fall apart.

While I'm not in the sandwich generation at this point, I've been there. Shortly after starting my business in 2001,