Dear Entrepreneur,
While building my first startup company, I discovered that I had been keeping track of everything I lacked, and this was actively draining my energy. You see, dwelling on all your mishaps don’t automatically lead to a surge in productivity. In fact, it is quite the opposite.
As a young tech entrepreneur—I was 19 years old—and I based my self-worth on out-competing others around me. This made me more insecure and anxious, which is ultimately self-defeating.
Over the years, I learned that for motivation to be effective and sustainable, we have to practice self-compassion. In fact, it’s much easier for self-compassionate individuals to improve on their mistakes, failures, and shortcomings, because they view them more objectively.
In a nutshell, I had to stop comparing myself to others and rather, focus on all the things I was doing right in order to grow my business in a scalable way.
When we have the ability to recognize and own our failures, we begin to develop more resilience and become more able to cope with adversity.
With love,
Chidi