Entrepreneurs Make Everything Up

Few experiences teach you that everything is made up more than becoming an entrepreneur. While I advocate it as strongly as I advocate anything, this isn’t a suggestion to be one. It’s a suggestion to take up an unmistakable lesson that entrepreneurship teaches you.

Everything is made up.

You know when you go to a restaurant, even a chain restaurants, and you see that it’s open because it has that sign in the front window flipped to read “Open” from the street and “Closed” from inside? You recognize the font, the orange color, and the white background. The font, color, and white background are all made up. The way the cashier greets you, the order of the questions she asks, whether they hold your card until you sign the receipt and hand it back (or not), and even what the hell is even printed on that receipt is decided by someone.

It’s understandable to walk around your life repeating silently in your head “..but, of course” every time you interact with something that makes some sense, but I encourage you to recognize that the designer of the sign, the manager who taught the cashier how to speak to you, and the poor soul that programmed the receipt to include www.chipotle.com at the bottom (but not the phone number) was a decision that was far from automatic. Sure, sometimes books get written and manuals get put in place and programs are designed to automate some things, but even those are made up.

In fact, when entrepreneurs decide to say something is to be true, they are making them up out of thin air. And, if that doesn’t inspire you to make up whatever it is that you want to be true, then I don’t know what will.

Logan Gelbrich

@functionalcoach