Hello everyone! My name is Mika, and I am an 18-year-old guy from The Netherlands.
In September, I started going to university and followed the program Entrepreneurship & Business Innovation. However, I quit after three weeks.
When I was still in high school, I knew I didn't want to go to university and get a job, but to pursue business and entrepreneurship. My dad unknowingly has been a big reason for this. He has run and runs multiple pretty successful businesses, nothing extraordinary but still very profitable. This is the reason why I have always been attracted to entrepreneurship for as long as I can remember.
Learning for me was always something I did after school, and I preferred it that way. Then why did I still go to university? Mainly I was influenced by the daily question I got from friends & family: "What are you going to study after high school?". I got multiple weird looks from relatives & friends whenever I said that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. So when I heard that there was going to be a new program at a university called Entrepreneurship & Business Innovation, I was pretty interested and relieved to have an answer to that annoying question.
Fast forward to September, and my program was starting. The first week was the introduction week. I met my classmates, teachers, and mentors. I realized after reading TMF , and a lot of threads on the forum that 90% of my classmates are so-called wantrepreneurs. I immediately got a wrong feeling about my choice of going to university. A week later, and the program is now starting. I pretty much lost all my free time within a week. And I was not enjoying one bit of the program. It was all theory, statistics, statistics, more statistics, a bit of finance, and what felt like an upsell: I had to purchase a test that cost 100 euros to see where I was on my entrepreneurial journey. They also mentioned the first year was all about finding a new idea.
The next week was pretty much the same as the previous one: theory. I knew from this moment I wanted to quit. I was sitting on the train on my way home, and I wrote everything down. My feelings, pros and cons, how I would tell my parents, etc. I think I wrote for two hours straight. I was an emotional wreck at this moment. My feelings were everywhere. So I come home. I tell my parents, they weren't happy but also not mad. All things considered, the conversation went pretty well. I think they were more scared (especially my mom) than mad.
So after this, I immediately started working on setting up a web design agency and I got my first "client' by doing some work for his businesses. This is something I'm very grateful for. It gave me a bit of income, even though this wasn't really a concern for me because my expenses are very low.
Around this time I also started to read TMF . I loved the book, it was so refreshing after all the guru books I read. I was now focused on getting some more web design work done, I cold emailed, reached out to friends & family, and went on freelancing sites. I got some very positive responses, but no clients.
I started to doubt myself, however, I wasn't going to give up. I knew I just needed to learn a lot, I had no experience and money so my only option was learning and adapting. Then I realized MJ mentioning this forum in his book and some of his videos. I joined and I'm now in the process of going to all of the notable and gold threads and making notes on things that are relevant for me. I have found a lot of gems so far. I'm also at the moment reading Unscripted (almost finished, never read a book so fast as this one) and learning copywriting from @Lex DeVille post.
This forum gave me a lot of ideas and I have a very clear idea of what I have to do & learn next. I want to thank all of you for that! I will post updates regarding my web design agency as soon as I have any. Again, thank you to everyone on this forum. I will strive to provide value to other people in the years to come as I go on this journey.
Thank you all for reading this far.
In September, I started going to university and followed the program Entrepreneurship & Business Innovation. However, I quit after three weeks.
When I was still in high school, I knew I didn't want to go to university and get a job, but to pursue business and entrepreneurship. My dad unknowingly has been a big reason for this. He has run and runs multiple pretty successful businesses, nothing extraordinary but still very profitable. This is the reason why I have always been attracted to entrepreneurship for as long as I can remember.
Learning for me was always something I did after school, and I preferred it that way. Then why did I still go to university? Mainly I was influenced by the daily question I got from friends & family: "What are you going to study after high school?". I got multiple weird looks from relatives & friends whenever I said that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. So when I heard that there was going to be a new program at a university called Entrepreneurship & Business Innovation, I was pretty interested and relieved to have an answer to that annoying question.
Fast forward to September, and my program was starting. The first week was the introduction week. I met my classmates, teachers, and mentors. I realized after reading TMF , and a lot of threads on the forum that 90% of my classmates are so-called wantrepreneurs. I immediately got a wrong feeling about my choice of going to university. A week later, and the program is now starting. I pretty much lost all my free time within a week. And I was not enjoying one bit of the program. It was all theory, statistics, statistics, more statistics, a bit of finance, and what felt like an upsell: I had to purchase a test that cost 100 euros to see where I was on my entrepreneurial journey. They also mentioned the first year was all about finding a new idea.
The next week was pretty much the same as the previous one: theory. I knew from this moment I wanted to quit. I was sitting on the train on my way home, and I wrote everything down. My feelings, pros and cons, how I would tell my parents, etc. I think I wrote for two hours straight. I was an emotional wreck at this moment. My feelings were everywhere. So I come home. I tell my parents, they weren't happy but also not mad. All things considered, the conversation went pretty well. I think they were more scared (especially my mom) than mad.
So after this, I immediately started working on setting up a web design agency and I got my first "client' by doing some work for his businesses. This is something I'm very grateful for. It gave me a bit of income, even though this wasn't really a concern for me because my expenses are very low.
Around this time I also started to read TMF . I loved the book, it was so refreshing after all the guru books I read. I was now focused on getting some more web design work done, I cold emailed, reached out to friends & family, and went on freelancing sites. I got some very positive responses, but no clients.
I started to doubt myself, however, I wasn't going to give up. I knew I just needed to learn a lot, I had no experience and money so my only option was learning and adapting. Then I realized MJ mentioning this forum in his book and some of his videos. I joined and I'm now in the process of going to all of the notable and gold threads and making notes on things that are relevant for me. I have found a lot of gems so far. I'm also at the moment reading Unscripted (almost finished, never read a book so fast as this one) and learning copywriting from @Lex DeVille post.
This forum gave me a lot of ideas and I have a very clear idea of what I have to do & learn next. I want to thank all of you for that! I will post updates regarding my web design agency as soon as I have any. Again, thank you to everyone on this forum. I will strive to provide value to other people in the years to come as I go on this journey.
Thank you all for reading this far.
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