Join us as we embark together upon a journey through the world of e-myths, or entrepreneur myths. We’ll help you avoid falling into the e-myth trap that causes so many entrepreneurs to fail before they even get started.
What Is An E-Myth?
Never heard the term before? Entrepreneur myths are common misconceptions people have about what it actually takes to succeed at business. Usually, you’ll hear that you only need three main things:
- Desire or passion for your business
- Enough capital to get started
- A projection or target profit after a set period
If it was really that easy, that’d be great. Sadly, that’s just not realistic. It’s an e-myth.
Debunking The Myths
So, if that’s not the realistic view, what is? Starting a business is more like a marathon. Sure, you start out full of energy and passion and may even make incredible progress. But, after just a few miles, your energy starts to fade. This leads to people slowing down their progress and maybe even dropping out entirely.
It’s nice to start out strong, but just like with a marathon, if you go too hard too fast, you’ll burn out. Instead, building a successful business takes stamina and agility.
The truth behind common e-myths is there are many different facets to a successful business. If you only focus on the three we mentioned above, finding success might be like exerting all your energy in the first 15 minutes of a 10K marathon.
The Entrepreneurial Roller Coaster
One part of starting a business that can’t be ignored is the entrepreneurial seizure. This is what many refer to as the emotional roller coaster involved with starting, nurturing, and dealing with the potential failure of a business. Just like roller coasters, it’s filled with lows and highs, but if you look past entrepreneur myths, your lows and highs might not be nearly as extreme.
Odds are, you might deal with the following emotions in order:
- Exhilaration
- Exhaustion
- Despair
- Sense of self-loss
No one really wants to go through all that. The problem is it’s easy to buy into e-myths and get excited over how easy it’s going to be. You start out with such high hopes about instant success that all it takes is the smallest setback to create an emotional tailspin.
Another e-myth we didn’t mention is that entrepreneurs often think they can do it all alone. When the stark realization dawns that no one can do it all by themselves, it makes the situation even worse. You realize you don’t have all the knowledge to handle every aspect of your business.
Your instinct might be to throw up your hands and quit. You don’t have to give up or hide away. All you have to do is learn how to push past the unrealistic expectations created by e-myths.
Instead of letting your passion come to an end, use our Reimagine and Reinvent course to figure out a new path, beat those feelings of being overwhelmed and reinvent yourself as the entrepreneur you always wanted to be.