The secret to success is to work for it and not give up.  I remember reading once, I think in one of Covey’s books, that failures have no idea why they failed, but successful people can tell you every step they took.  The lesson there is that successful people have a plan, they work the plan, and they keep going after failure.

Being an entrepreneur is challenging.  We have to have a particular kind of naivete in the face of others’ comments that “your book will never sell,” “readers don’t want new writers,” and all the other naysayers that are trying, they say, to “help” us.   If we are daring enough to try other entrepreneurial ideas, it’s the same thing – I have a friend who wants to open a restaurant/bar and has been told a whole bunch of reasons why it’s a dumb idea.

None of those naysayers are right, but it’s hard to see that when we’re risking our reputations and sometimes real money on our dreams.  Learning to surround ourselves with people who will safeguard our baby ideas and shepherd our dreams is difficult.  Skepticism is seen as smart or wise, and the willingness to risk is seen as reckless.

Writers become authors because we love telling stories and we love it so much that we have to do it, whether it “pays for itself” or not.  We risk putting our stories out there into the world, and we risk looking like fools.

It’s worth it.

What about you, Dear Reader?
What would you risk if you knew you could not fail?