For regular readers of this column, you have seen many words written on the topic of dreaming that entrepreneurial dream and making it a reality.
Occurrences in my life this past week have again prompted me to share my thoughts about the entrepreneurial spirit.
Dreaming that dream keeps me in the entrepreneurial roller coaster ride.
The challenge for me is how to describe those feelings about entrepreneurial dreaming in a way that maybe you can feel it too, what it means to dream an enterprise into existence.
Not a business, not a practice, but an enterprise —a new venture creation.
In a nutshell, that is the dream of an entrepreneur—to discover, launch and grow an enterprise.
And make no mistake, an entrepreneur passionately wishes to touch many people with his or her new venture in such a profound and brilliant way so that other people are drawn to it, excited by it, and can translate its success into a leadership role in our community.
Every so often in my travels, I come across this different kind of entrepreneur—people who dream bigger than their background, education and experience suggests they can.
They never stop dreaming, regardless of their circumstances or obstacles.
This is not to say these people don’t experience failure or get discouraged, but they are the kind of entrepreneur who simply creates another dream when their current dream dissolves.
I also do not mean this in a negative sense, but they don’t allow discouragement or disappointment to crush them.
If these qualities and characteristics describe you, then I would like to ask you a few questions this week:
Have you identified what your dreams are by writing them down?
Are you living out your dreams?
Perhaps your entrepreneurial dream is to be financially independent or to build a successful new venture.
Maybe creating a new venture means determining your own work schedule.
What might be keeping you from dreaming bigger than you do now? How focused are you on expanding your dream machine?
Whatever your dream and regardless of how well developed, I truly believe that most successful entrepreneurial dreamers go through some form of a “process” unique to themselves.
The first milestone seems to be the very essence of daring to dream.
Yes, I know you’ll say everyone dreams, but successful entrepreneurs keep dreaming even when everyone and everything seems to be working against them.
While most people might simply give up in the face of such adversity, I believe true entrepreneurs keep going, just like the Ever-ready bunny, keep plugging forward.
While most dreams come in moments of inspiration, give yourself time to do nothing but dream, exercise and embrace reflection.
Think about where you find your creativity and commit yourself to doing things, even the very few things that will be creative and stimulating.
This past year, I have been reading voraciously the writings of John Maxwell, who speaks and writes passionately about the role of leadership, and about the power and absolute necessity of reflection in our daily lives.
Perhaps Maxwell doesn’t realize his musings for being the best one can be and becoming a leader from within includes becoming an entrepreneurial dreamer.
Once you have found your new dream, the successful entrepreneur always, always, always realizes the need to talk about it, think about it, plan for it and eventually define it.
Do you have a dream? Do you ever think about writing it down in as much detail as possible? Revise it? Have others critique it? Analyze it until you have crossed the “ bridge of reality” that convinces you that maybe you are on the verge of a realistic opportunity for you?
I personally love that thought of rising up again from the ashes of temporary defeat of a dream, and to rise higher than before. Think of it being that moment when you have crossed over that next hill and the valley of victory lies beneath your feet.
At that point, you have the dream in your grasp, your excitement swells—you have come so far with your entrepreneurial dream that you can’t stop now.
Once you are on your way to entrepreneurial success, you then must learn how to most effectively channel your energy and resources to produce the greatest return.
Our Okanagan Valley has a wonderful network of helpful resources to assist you to evaluate and screen your dream, and to hold you accountable for defining, developing and directing your entrepreneurial dream.
A short few years ago, we put into motion an Okanagan Valley Entrepreneurs Society, a vehicle in which like-minded entrepreneurs have a playground to share their joys and trials with their fellow dreamers.
Friends, one of the goals of my column is to hopefully help you find that path to your entrepreneurial dream machine, encourage you to make it work and embrace the joy of a successful journey.
