“I closed my biggest deal ever this week. I’m the next Steve Jobs!”
……………1 week later……………
“2 of our main customers just canceled their contracts. I am a failure as a human being.”
Have you encountered mental loops like these in your entrepreneurial journey?
As entrepreneurs (or whatever work we’re involved with), often we become deeply personally identified with the work we’re doing and the results of that work. It’s this deep sense of “I am my company” or “I am a <Insert Job Title>” or “My self worth is dependent on quarterly sales.”
It’s a trap that many of us fall into, and it’s understandable given the intense nature of our work as entrepreneurs. In fact, becoming identified with our company may even seem impossible to avoid
However, to generate sustainable and repeatable success over the long-run, it’s extremely important to separate our personal identity from our business results.
Why?
To lead an organization or a team (or even just ourselves) with clarity and wisdom, we need a high degree of equanimity. Essentially, this means having a deep sense of inner balance, composure, and confidence that shields us from succumbing to the compulsive cycles of reactivity.
The situations we face in life and business are inevitably difficult and challenging. Especially as a first time CEO, you’re going to face many situations where you have absolutely no idea what to do. It’s just a part of the job. Everyone faces it (even if they don’t talk openly about it). Whether you react emotionally or respond consciously to these situations could mean the difference between your success and failure.
Equanimity is the most essential ingredient.
And understanding oneself is the key to equanimity.
Identification and Emotion
Why is personal identification with our company so problematic?
Anything we strongly identify with essentially becomes an extension of our ego. The ego is perpetually concerned with its personal safety and survival. The ego craves love, safety, belonging, and status. There’s nothing wrong with this as these concerns are vital to our physical survival. But, when we extend them into our business pursuits, it leads to problems.
Ego identification with our business creates a situation in which our emotional wellbeing and mental balance become dependent on the week to week volatility of the startup’s activities. That is, our emotional state becomes entangled in a reactionary relationship to what’s happening in the company. Because of this extension of ego, everything that’s happening in the company feels like it’s touching our core identity, so we become overly sensitive to things.
One week may be a big win, so we’re incredibly high (The “I’m Steve Jobs” syndrome). One week may be a big disappointment, so we’re extremely low (the “I’m a worthless human” syndrome). These emotional swings can lead us to make decisions either from a place of overconfidence or from a place of desperation, either of which is detrimental to long term success.
From this state of ego identification, consciously or unconsciously, we make decisions based upon what satisfies our emotional needs rather than what’s best for the organization and the other team members. We add fuel to the dysfunction of the organization, and unconsciously manipulate people and situations, so we feel more loved, secure, or validated.
Facing the Tough Questions
We also may avoid facing the tough questions.
What am I not saying that needs to be said?
Often, for the sake of ego safety, we flake on making the tough the decisions or having the uncomfortable conversations which are often the most critical levers in moving business forward.
What is being said that I’m not hearing?
Often, we ignore information that challenges our present assumptions and beliefs, especially when we are emotionally involved in these beliefs. This type of inbound information often flows from employees and customers in subtle ways. We should tune ourselves to seek out this type of information, rather than cover our eyes to avoid it. This type of honest, unfiltered feedback represents precious insight.
As entrepreneurs, we want to influence reality.
We want to create something!
But the only way to influence reality successfully is to engage with reality the way it is, not what we would like to believe it to be. Ego is like dirt on the windshield distorting our vision.
May we dream of the stars, but keep our feet on the ground.
Who Am I?
The ultimate question of all true seekers is the ancient and enigmatic question of “who am I?” Whether we consider ourselves spiritually inclined or not, it’s an important question to consider if we care about the quality and results of our life. This question holds the key to our equanimity.
Consider this…
Without being able to reference anything you do now or anything you’ve done in the past, describe who you are. You can’t describe what you do for work. You can’t list your credentials. You can’t even list what you do for fun or your relationships with other people. Who are you? What are your core values? What is your way of being?
You may realize you’ve defined yourself your entire life by what you’re doing, rather than by what you truly are.
When we strip away all of the labels, it can be scary. We feel naked, exposed, and vulnerable. It opens many unanswered questions. But, this is vitally important work to do.
What you do is impermanent, ephemeral, and is really a tenuous thing to attach an identity to.
In contrast, what you are, that most profound truth within yourself, that is yours forever. No person or circumstance can ever take that from you. It’s eternal, regardless of the tumult of the external world. Connecting with this inner essence directly naturally results in equanimity.
And experiencing equanimity is the lever which makes us exponentially wiser and more capable in all else that we do.
In my journey, asking this simple question of “who am I” within myself, again and again and again, has been the most essential ingredient in my radical self-transformation.
So, I challenge you to look within. Expose the shadows to the light. Dig for the inner treasure. Experience the love that you are.
Who are you?
🙏 Alex Blanton
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