To all novices in business. One biggy: Grow tough skin.
It's a mean world out there. If you don't grow tough skin you will self-destruct. It's one thing making cash. It's another handling people who call you a thief and a fraud. Because there will always be such people. You know the drill: Rich people are always thiefs. It's as old as human kind itself. It has been here longer than we have been here.
It's one thing saying you get it, but it is a totally another matter when you actually stand in the limelight and everyone want to finish you of because you are successful.
I got my dose of this when I started my financial company. I have never been in the limelight as heavily as that particular time. It was a witch hunt. I was a guy who supposedly scammed people. I was supposedly a guy who had conned people (even though I hadn't and no one wanted to prove me wrong either). They said I was taking advantage of people who where in a debt position. Instead of seeing it as I saw it (that I actually where the saving angel who wanted to save the world), they saw me as the evil guy.
So whatever good you do, human kind will always find a way of knocking you down a few notches. Just because they can. And it will not be pretty.
The only way to survive? Grow tough skin. Because you only have yourself when all hell breaks lose. And it will. Always. If you are seen, you are a fair target.
That is the nature of being an entrepreneur. And by the way: I am not even a high profile kind of guy and I got trouble big time for wanting to do a nice thing to support society. Then just think about how it must feel to be Donald Trump, Bill Gates or Paris Hilton for that matter. I don't admire their celebrity status. It seems glamorous, but believe me, it isn't.
Eddie Murphy was once interviewed. They asked him about how he handled critics. His answer was simple "I don't read any news about me". Good advice. I have started doing the same thing. I don't google myself and I don't read forums with bad news about me. If I see something that might be bad critic about myself I try to avoid it as fast as I can (try not to be involved, because I certainly will if I see it). Because I don't want to ruin a perfectly good day.
The way to grow though skin is all about being good at selective behaviour. Ignoring some stuff (the bad once) and seeing the good things.
It's a mean world out there. If you don't grow tough skin you will self-destruct. It's one thing making cash. It's another handling people who call you a thief and a fraud. Because there will always be such people. You know the drill: Rich people are always thiefs. It's as old as human kind itself. It has been here longer than we have been here.
It's one thing saying you get it, but it is a totally another matter when you actually stand in the limelight and everyone want to finish you of because you are successful.
I got my dose of this when I started my financial company. I have never been in the limelight as heavily as that particular time. It was a witch hunt. I was a guy who supposedly scammed people. I was supposedly a guy who had conned people (even though I hadn't and no one wanted to prove me wrong either). They said I was taking advantage of people who where in a debt position. Instead of seeing it as I saw it (that I actually where the saving angel who wanted to save the world), they saw me as the evil guy.
So whatever good you do, human kind will always find a way of knocking you down a few notches. Just because they can. And it will not be pretty.
The only way to survive? Grow tough skin. Because you only have yourself when all hell breaks lose. And it will. Always. If you are seen, you are a fair target.
That is the nature of being an entrepreneur. And by the way: I am not even a high profile kind of guy and I got trouble big time for wanting to do a nice thing to support society. Then just think about how it must feel to be Donald Trump, Bill Gates or Paris Hilton for that matter. I don't admire their celebrity status. It seems glamorous, but believe me, it isn't.
Eddie Murphy was once interviewed. They asked him about how he handled critics. His answer was simple "I don't read any news about me". Good advice. I have started doing the same thing. I don't google myself and I don't read forums with bad news about me. If I see something that might be bad critic about myself I try to avoid it as fast as I can (try not to be involved, because I certainly will if I see it). Because I don't want to ruin a perfectly good day.
The way to grow though skin is all about being good at selective behaviour. Ignoring some stuff (the bad once) and seeing the good things.
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