A shot of Medellin at night, the place I’ll call home for the next 6 months
My Longest Standing Employee Is Leaving
The individual whom I’ve taught for the last 2 years. The person who does about 70% of the deliverable work in my business.
He is leaving at the end of the month.
I still don’t have a new employee chosen yet. I had someone I felt very confident in, but she ended up choosing another job.
I lost a client this week, and quite positive I’ll be losing another one today or early next week.
And the month is still early 😬. In general, I lose 1 client every 3 months or so, so this is a bit of a shock.
The last few sales calls I’ve had felt a lot like people just fishing for as much info as they can get, so they can try to emulate my work themselves.
These sales calls become quite frustrating, and cause me to lose faith in my sales abilities as well as the benevolence of humanity.
Yesterday, All My Troubles Seemed So Far Away
Me enjoying the nightlife here in Medellin
Just last Thursday I was out with a friend. We were talking about life, work, various social and political situations in Colombia. She works with the UN and has a lot of insights and unique perceptions on things.
During the conversation I mentioned how lucky I am. How my life is too easy. How I’ve worked to get where I am, but still had a bunch of head starts and breaks to get here, particularly compared to the populations she works with.
I ended up drinking pretty heavily that night, and checked a few emails but mostly slept the next day. I just decided to take a Friday off because I felt like it, the freedom man…
Then this week I was hit with a couple of the surprises above.
The saying that ‘when it rains it pours’ is an interesting one.
I wonder if things are really that bad, or if I’m caught in a negative mindset, where I’m only seeing the negative stuff going on.
I think it’s a bit of both. This is an unique month for sure, and that makes it easy to get stuck in the negativity. A lens that I throw over anything that happens in my business, to ignore the good and focus on the bad.
So this is why a lot of people don’t run businesses
Because this shit is not nearly as predictable as a regular job, because there are times where it’s feels hopeless, because you constantly doubt yourself and your abilities. Work is always on your mind, always, you never fully check out.
Then There’s The Opposite Reaction
I’m A F***in Fighter Man
When others quit, that’s when I start to feel the excitement grow within me. The excitement at the prospect of overcoming, of proving myself.
It’s in the moments like this where I earn the lifestyle I have.
In addition to my advantages, the reason I have a business and travel the world is because I ultimately love overcoming hurdles.
I couldn’t handle an easy, predictable job
Here’s an anecdote to explain this a bit.
On my first long-distance bike ride from Cancun, Mexico to Antigua Guatemala I began to notice something.
One morning I was cycling alone in Belize, no one around for miles and it starts torrentially raining accompanied by regular, ear-blasting lightning. I recall the ecstacy I felt at the challenge, cycling all alone and seeing lightning crack in front of me while fighting to see through the sheets of rain.
I was in the middle of nowhere, in a fairly serious tropical storm, and there wasn’t another place in the world I’d rather be.
I fucking loved that day, I’ve cycled a lot, but that day remains one my favorite days of cycling.
I’d have other mountainous areas, and trucks driving me off the side of the road however, on those days I never thought of quitting.
The days that were the hardest were the days where it was a flat, straight road and all I could see in front of me was the road slowly unfolding. Further and further, seemingly without an end.
The monotonous days were always the hardest for me. Never the “difficult” days.
There are a number of reasons for this, but rooted at the heart of this is the fact that I’m a bit of a masochist.
I like fighting against things
I love resistance
I crave something to overcome
I can hear an ex-girlfriend of mine saying “Ya, that’s trauma”, and I can recognize that.
While it may be a form of unresolved issues, at the end of the day that’s where I’m at now.
Beautiful spot in Guatemala, doing some repairs on the bike
Feelings don’t disappear though
I recognize that ignoring the emotions I’m feeling and powering through will help me in the short term, but it’s not like those emotions disappear.
They’ll come out later, when I’m talking to friends and family in the form of anger and resentment.
There’s a pretty interesting graph below about mens emotions and how, if suppressed they can just turn into anger / resentment.
Fortunately, my anger doesn’t boil into violence very often, but the point is still there. Not addressing my emotions means I’ll just end up being an asshole to people around me.
I’m not sure how to strike the balance
I don’t know how to balance the part of me that is scared and hurt by everything that’s happening and the individual that’s actually excited by the new opportunities.
Perhaps that excited part of me is a defense mechanism for my fear. Something I’ve created a long time ago to evade negative feelings, and turn all negatives into things that can ultimately serve me.
So What Do I do?
Firstly, I need to recognize that my defense mechanism to turn all negatives into positives is a hell of a way to deal with problems.
While I’ll work to feel those feelings of fear, I did come across a roadblock here, and I have built a pretty bad ass process to get through those roadblocks.
Over the next few weeks I’m going to do what I can to create some space and awareness around both aspects of me, so I can utilize both of them for the ultimate betterment of myself and others around me.
Or at least I’m gonna fucking try 😂
