Finding the Courage to become an entrepreneur
My entrepreneurial journey started in 2018 in a quiet apartment in South End where I moved after my big apple dreams unexpectedly ended up in my rearview mirror.
Like most people, I moved to NYC in the summer of 2016 with some seriously giant goals. I was going to lead a marketing team at a cosmetic start-up, travel the country producing trade shows, and, obviously, adopt a Carry Bradshaw-worthy wardrobe. I wish that’s how it had gone and then again, in hindsight, I don’t.
My job was sour from day one. My boss was unkind, manipulative, and on occasion verbally abusive. I stuck it out for a year, but the damage was already done. I spent the next year temping at hedge funds in Manhattan and attempting to untangle the yarn ball of thoughts and confusion over what had gone wrong in my career, where I could have been better, and what was next. I had played the performance game, burned the midnight oil, broken sales goals, scaled my department’s reach 3x, and it still wasn’t enough. The problem must have been me. I put myself out there and was found to be lacking. Or at least that’s how I felt at the time.
Mentally exhausted, I packed my bags up and moved home feeling like an utter failure.
They say everything happens for a reason and this is why I believe it to be true. I always had little businesses growing up. I am the daughter and niece of entrepreneurs. It’s in my blood, but the risk always felt like too much. Until it wasn’t. On New Year's Eve of 2019, I started realizing how much of 2018 I’d spent telling myself “no” in the name of protecting myself from more rejection. I don’t usually set resolutions, but I did decide on one thing—I was going to try this whole entrepreneur thing and get comfortable with feeling underqualified and out of my comfort zone. I was going to get vulnerable.
It started so uncomfortably at first, but the more I said yes, the more courage I had to send out another cold email or apply for a freelance bid. And then it stopped being scary altogether and started just being fun.
My second year of business was 2020, and I wish I could say I charged forward with fearless abandon, but once again I was faced with the choice to be vulnerable enough to continue or to close shop. I could be hard on myself for all the things I wish I’d done better or play the comparison game that’s all too easy to do in our age of social media, but for the better part of the year, I chose to be quiet and pivot, which felt vulnerable too.
Now it’s 2021 and life looks different all over again. A lot of days, I still wake up and have to choose courage over playing it safe. I don’t think safety ever feels unappealing but, amazingly, our natural fear doesn’t correlate to our ability to have courage. We can do both. We don’t have to be carelessly optimistic to go for our dream job, extend a hand to our neighbor in need, have a hard conversation, take the next best step, or allow ourselves to be seen.
We can have courage.
We can be vulnerable.
We can always try again.
—Hannah
Hannah Krueger is the owner of Hannah Krueger Studio in Charlotte. She and her team specialize in crafting tailored website experiences for bold entrepreneurs. Hannah is the designer and story architect behind this beautiful WF&S website and dozens more. Learn more about her here.