What they don't tell you about entrepreneurship | Mark Leruste | TEDxCardiff
Summary
TLDRIn this TEDx talk, the speaker candidly shares the reality behind the glamorous facade of entrepreneurship. Despite the allure of freedom and success, the journey is often lonely and stressful. The speaker challenges the trendy image of entrepreneurship and highlights the importance of vulnerability and seeking help. They argue that the true motivation for many to start businesses is a deep-seated desire for purpose and meaning, which can be found in various forms beyond entrepreneurship. The talk encourages listeners to follow their curiosity and embrace small steps towards their personal quests, ultimately contributing to a better world.
Takeaways
- 🌟 Entrepreneurship is often perceived as a glamorous and successful lifestyle, but it can be lonely and stressful.
- 🚀 The rise of superstar entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Richard Branson has made starting a business seem attractive and cool.
- 🤔 Many entrepreneurs struggle with feelings of loneliness, stress, and financial worries, despite the outward appearance of success.
- 📉 Statistics show that a significant number of businesses fail within the first 18 months, and entrepreneurship is not as easy as it seems.
- 😔 One in three entrepreneurs experiences depression, highlighting the mental health challenges associated with starting and running a business.
- 🌍 The desire for purpose and meaning in work is a driving force for many people considering entrepreneurship.
- 📊 A Gallup study found that 87% of workers worldwide feel emotionally disengaged from their work, leading to a search for purpose.
- 🛸 The allure of entrepreneurship is not just about fame and fortune but also about fulfilling a deeper yearning for a sense of purpose.
- 🔍 Finding one's purpose doesn't have to be about discovering the meaning of life but can be found in smaller, meaningful quests.
- 🚀 Starting a business or pursuing a bold idea can be rewarding, but it's important to recognize the challenges and seek support when needed.
- 🌱 Trusting one's curiosity and interests can lead to finding a personal quest, which may or may not involve entrepreneurship.
Q & A
What is the main theme of the TEDx talk?
-The main theme of the talk is the reality of entrepreneurship, the loneliness and struggles it entails, and the importance of finding purpose and meaning in one's life, whether through starting a business or other means.
How does the speaker describe their daily routine?
-The speaker describes waking up at 5 a.m. without an alarm clock, driven by passion, doing power yoga, taking a cold shower, visualizing goals, and consuming a green smoothie before most people check their social media.
What misconceptions does the speaker address about entrepreneurship?
-The speaker addresses the misconception that entrepreneurship is always successful, glamorous, and easy. They highlight the loneliness, stress, and financial worries that entrepreneurs often face.
Why did the speaker quit their job to become an entrepreneur?
-The speaker quit their job after a decade in the corporate, not-for-profit, and charity sectors, believing that being their own boss would bring them the flexibility, freedom, and success they desired.
What is the speaker's experience with social media and its portrayal of success?
-The speaker has a successful social media presence, but they acknowledge that this portrayal of success is often a facade, as they struggle with the realities of entrepreneurship behind the scenes.
What statistics does the speaker mention about entrepreneurship in the UK?
-The speaker mentions that out of 5.5 million businesses in the UK, 76% were started by people who employ no one but themselves, indicating a high level of loneliness in entrepreneurship.
What study did the speaker reference regarding entrepreneurship and mental health?
-The speaker references a study by Professor Michael Freeman from the University of California, which found that one in three entrepreneurs experiences depression.
How does the speaker describe the rise of the superstar entrepreneur?
-The speaker describes the rise of superstar entrepreneurs like Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Steve Jobs, who have become the new aspiring celebrities of the 21st century, making entrepreneurship seem sexy and cool.
What does the speaker suggest is the true motivation behind people starting businesses?
-The speaker suggests that the true motivation behind people starting businesses is a deeper yearning for a sense of purpose, rather than just the chase for fame and fortune.
What advice does the speaker give to those struggling with their entrepreneurial journey?
-The speaker advises being vulnerable and open about struggles, as it allows friends to understand and offer help. They also encourage following one's curiosity and interests as a way to find one's quest or purpose.
What is the speaker's definition of a 'microquest'?
-A 'microquest' is a small, personal challenge or goal that the speaker pursued, such as starting a drink startup in seven days with a hundred pounds, to answer a deeper question or satisfy their curiosity.
Outlines
🌟 The Illusion of Entrepreneurial Success
The speaker begins with a satirical portrayal of a successful entrepreneur's life, highlighting the disparity between the glamorous image portrayed on social media and the reality of the struggles faced. They discuss the loneliness, stress, and the constant worry about finances that come with running a business. The speaker shares their personal experience of leaving a stable job to pursue entrepreneurship, only to find that the freedom and success they imagined were not as straightforward as they seemed.
📉 The Harsh Reality of Starting a Business
The speaker delves into the statistics of business failure and the mental health issues that entrepreneurs often face. They mention the societal pressure to appear successful and the reluctance to admit vulnerability. The speaker reflects on their own experiences and the challenges of starting a business, including the unexpected loneliness and the difficulty of maintaining a work-life balance. They also touch on the rise of entrepreneurship as a trend and the impact of celebrity entrepreneurs on the perception of starting a business.
🚀 The Quest for Purpose Beyond Entrepreneurship
The speaker explores the deeper human need for purpose and how it drives people to take risks and pursue bold ideas, like entrepreneurship. They reference a Gallup study on worker engagement and discuss the millennial generation's search for meaningful work. The speaker shares personal anecdotes and examples of 'microquests' that bring a sense of purpose and fulfillment, emphasizing that purpose can be found in various forms and does not necessarily require starting a business.
🌈 Embracing Curiosity and Finding Your Quest
The speaker concludes by encouraging the audience to follow their curiosity and interests as a way to discover their personal quest for purpose. They argue that small, deceptively simple actions can lead to significant achievements and a sense of purpose. The speaker shares the story of an individual who painted 100 pieces of art as a way to express gratitude, illustrating the power of personal quests. They end with a call to action, urging everyone to start their own quest, regardless of its size or nature, to contribute to a better world.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Entrepreneurship
💡Social Media
💡Loneliness
💡Success
💡Vulnerability
💡Purpose
💡Microquest
💡Quest
💡Mental Health
💡Work-Life Balance
💡Aspiration
Highlights
The speaker's life appears successful on social media, but they admit to feeling lonely and stressed about finances.
Entrepreneurship has become trendy, but it's not always as glamorous as it seems.
Many entrepreneurs struggle with mental health issues, including depression.
The rise of superstar entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Richard Branson has influenced the perception of entrepreneurship.
The pursuit of entrepreneurship is often driven by a deeper yearning for a sense of purpose.
Having a sense of purpose is linked to better mental health and even a longer life.
The speaker shares their own experience of starting a business in a week with a small budget.
The speaker emphasizes the importance of following one's curiosity and interests as a path to finding one's quest.
Starting a business is not the only way to find purpose; it can be found in various aspects of life.
The speaker encourages everyone to start their quest, no matter how small, to make the world a better place.
Entrepreneurship is often misunderstood as a path to fame and fortune, but it's more about the pursuit of a meaningful quest.
The speaker challenges the notion that finding one's purpose means discovering the meaning of life.
The speaker suggests that small, curious interests can lead to significant quests and a sense of purpose.
The speaker shares a story of a woman who painted 100 pieces of art to express gratitude, illustrating the power of personal quests.
The speaker advises to trust the breadcrumbs of curiosity, even if they seem unrelated or intimidating.
The speaker quotes Paul Graham, emphasizing the importance of starting with small steps to achieve big things.
Transcripts
[Applause]
at tedx about to give a killer talk
if only they could see me now
next stop oprah
hashtag livingthedream hashtag winning
crushing it
how could i forget
[Laughter]
my life is amazing
i wake up
at 5 00 a.m
every day with a big smile on my face
and that's without an alarm clock
and you know why
because my passion wakes me
you see after an hour of power yoga i
hop in a cold shower where i visualize
my goals before i jump on a podcast
and green and green smoothie
that's before most of you have even had
time to scroll to your first social
media feed yes
unlike you i have the freedom to decide
how i spend my days i go on holiday when
i want
where i want and for how long i want
but
you already know that because you
obviously following me on instagram
you see success
is my first
last
and middle name
yes
you've guessed it
i'm an entrepreneur
and i'm living the dream
it's funny
because it almost sounds true
and it makes me wonder who is that guy
well
that's me
at least
that's what you would think
if you looked at my social media feed
you see we're currently writing a way
where entrepreneurship is hip
and like any fad when it doesn't go to
plan
it's really easy to put a brave face
keep up appearances and pretend like
you're successful even if you have no
idea what you're doing
but when did it become cool to become an
entrepreneur
in fact who here runs a business
do you feel cool
because i don't know about you
but i do not feel cool
in fact most of the time
i feel lonely
i worry
i stress about money on a daily basis
and this was so not meant to be the plan
you see about a year ago almost to the
day
i quit a job after spending a decade
working across the corporate sector
the not-for-profit and the charity
sector thinking
that if i quit my job everything i ever
dreamed for in life would come true
because obviously being your own boss
means that you have the flexibility
freedom
and success is bottomless
well it wasn't the case
you see maybe what it looks like on the
outside through all my podcasts and
youtube videos
it looks like i'm having a ball at a
time
but i actually spend eighty percent of
my time
staring nothing but a screen
and sometimes i don't even bother
leaving the flat
or wash
but don't tell my girlfriend that
because she thinks i do
and this this got me thinking
it's it's the same thing that when my
friends call me up and say hey mark do
you want to catch up for a beer and i
say i'm sorry i've got other plans i'm
busy
but i'm not busy
i'm just really really worried about how
my business is actually doing
and so i feel like i can't share that
and this is something that i've seen
over and over again so i'm the host of
the most unpronounceable podcast ever
known to mankind as dyslexic i could
have picked a better name
the unconventionalists and effectively
what it is i get to speak to a whole
bunch of really exciting people from all
walks of life who've experienced
different levels of success
and let me tell you this
it doesn't matter if you're a one-man
band or if you're a business with a
thousand employees if you have a hundred
followers or if you have a million
the resounding feeling is how tough the
journey is and how lonely it can
sometimes feel
now if you look at the statistics it's
pretty scary out of the 5.5 million
businesses in the uk
76
of them were started by people who
employ no one but themselves
so it's a pretty lonesome journey to
save the leaf for almost three quarters
of us
and yet we feel like we can't open up
and talk about it
because
we've made up
that tears
don't sell
and so
we live with this dirty little secret
except this secret is something that
everyone who's ever started a business
knows oh too well
and i started thinking
if you look at the statistics
and you look at company house data
it looks like
actually
in 2016 it was another record-breaking
year
of 75 new businesses every single hour
that's insane
bloomberg says that actually eight out
of ten entrepreneurs failed within the
first 18 months
and there was a study by the professor
michael freenum freeman from the
university of california that basically
studied the link between
entrepreneurship and mental health
issues and he found that one in three
entrepreneurs experiences depression
when the hell did entrepreneurship
become trendy
especially when you look 20 years ago
and it was basically a bunch of geeky
guys living in a box staring at a screen
well
you see
when i quit movember
i thought
that everything was going to come to me
i could have never imagined that after
spending four years in a dream job as
country manager raising 2.8 million
euros for men's self hobnobbing with
celebrities being interviewed on
national television and being part of
incredible team all that to start my own
business would be so tough and lonely
so when my friends and family ask me so
how are things going
i smile
i grind my teeth and i say great
when really what i want to say is this
is the toughest thing i've ever done in
my life
i'm really struggling
and if you can relate to this situation
i want you to know that actually
being vulnerable and telling your
friends that you're hurting is the best
way for them to know you need help
and i know that's scary
but instead i've been guilty of putting
up a mask and feeding the myth
that being an entrepreneur and living
the entrepreneurial lifestyle
is the lifestyle we should all aspire to
and that got me thinking surely there
must be a reason why so many people are
thinking about starting their business
well
i think this is my opinion
that because of the thanks the rise of
the superstar entrepreneur including
elon musk richard branson and steve jobs
the rise of the superstar entrepreneur
has given birth
to the new aspiring celebrity of the
21st century
social media and front cover magazines
have labeled it that make it sound sexy
and they make it sound cool and you know
what it is
it feeds into our need to be recognized
to be famous to be rich
but is the allure of being an
entrepreneur
for the chase of fame and fortune really
all there is to it
no
it goes deeper than that
consider the gallup study that found
that 87
of workers worldwide feel emotionally
disengaged from the work they do
and as a self-proclaimed millennial
we've got a bit of a pick-off especially
when you know that millennials are the
most purpose-driven generation in
decades
so there's no denying that we're
currently facing a crisis at work when
it comes down to finding purpose
take a look at this mythical ad of a
dream job and for those of you at the
back we can't read it
men wanted for hazardous journey
small wages bitter cold long months of
complete darkness constant danger safe
return
doubtful
honor and recognition
in case of success
would you apply to that ad
well according to the book the hundred
greatest advertisements
five thousand men responded to sir
ernest shackleton's ad ahead of his
third expedition to the south pole
endurance in the early 1900s 5 000
people
and you know what else this ad could
apply to
you've guessed it pretty much any
startup or any new business or any bold
idea you come across
because the way that he sorted out these
5 000 applicants was by putting them
either in mad
hopeless or possible and if you've ever
tried anything bold in life you'll know
what i mean when i say it's very
difficult to know in which category you
come across so the question becomes why
would thousands of people want to join
sir shackleton down to south pole
and would this still be applied today
and if you think it wouldn't
think again
mars one a controversial dutch company
announced in 2013
that its mission was to establish a
permanent human settlement on mars in
2023
two men and two women would originally
sent and then four more would follow
every two years
the catch
there is no return expected to planet
earth
labeled as the one-way ticket to human
kite's biggest adventure
more than two hundred 000 people
registered their interest in 2013.
that's insane
so
actually why would people join sir
shackleton 100 years ago and the reason
why hundreds of thousands of people are
willing to leave everything behind to
join history to the chase for mars
is the same reason why so many people
are attracted to the idea of becoming an
entrepreneur
it's a deeper yearning for a sense of
purpose
now
professor steve taylor the senior
lecturer in psychology at leeds beckett
university said that not having a sense
of purpose makes us more vulnerable to
anxiety
boredom and depression
because baked in every single human
brain from our ancestors fighting off
saber-toothed tigers to us wrestling a
really bad wi-fi connection
we all have a desire for purpose
it's our thirst for a mission
it's a yearning for a quest and to
fulfill it
psychology science even went as far as
saying that having a sense of purpose
gives you a much better chance of having
a longer life than pretty much anything
else
so your life depends on it
it's a bit of pressure right
well that kind of pressure is exactly
where we go wrong about finding your
purpose you see what really bugs me is
that people make up that when you talk
about finding your your meaning of of
being or your purpose you've got to find
the meaning of life you've got to find
the meaning of your life
and that's a really big ask the way i
see it is that if it was a thorny issue
for aristotle then i should probably
keep it simple
and if you don't know what a quest is
and you don't know what purpose is
look around you they're everywhere
they're in the books you read
in the stories you tell
and the movies you watch
i've been obsessed with this concept of
quest and finding a quest
and i've spoken to hundreds of people
who started theirs and this is what i've
learned
they come in all shapes and sizes
they're not measured by how impactful
they are but rather how they make you
feel
when you think about them
when you're actively pursuing them
i want to give you an example of a
really small quest what i've come to
label microquest now you see a few years
ago i had this really stupid idea to see
if i could start a drink startup in
seven days with a hundred pounds
and this was while i still had a
full-time job by the way so i'd wake up
at 6 a.m do recipes i was traveling try
and cross the border of belgium with one
kilo of protein powder in your bag
and the crazy thing is that i ended up
working my butt off for seven days went
to a festival in the woods and i sold
all my plant-based protein shakes
i made a whooping net profit
of nine pounds
it was the happiest i'd been of course i
had no idea if it was going to work but
actually when you look at it i was
trying to answer
a deeper question
is it possible
to start a business in a week with a
hundred pounds or less
now
i can't tell you what your quest is but
i can tell you what it feels like in
case you hear it knocking on your door
it's something that for whatever reason
is grabbing your curiosity even when you
don't want it to perhaps you're thinking
about it when you're in the shower or
maybe it's something to do when you're
doing over the weekend but i'd like to
share with you another example
take laurie podga
who for a year and a half decided to
paint 100 individual pieces of art for
100 people in her life who meant
something from her husband to a
hairdresser to the mechanic
her quest was to express her gratitude
through her art
and in the end she brought all these
people together in a really emotional
exhibition in a hometown of north
carolina
now you see this yearning we have of
having a quest having a purpose is at
the heart
of why so many people believe
that starting a business is the only way
to get that sense of freedom adventure
and purpose
but it's not
of course it can be and admittedly it
has been for me
yes a year ago when i quit my job to
start my business it's been the hardest
thing i've ever done
but it's also been the most rewarding
thing i've ever done
and this is what i've realized is that
actually
you think you want to start a business
but what you're actually looking for
is a quest
you can find purpose and meaning working
with an organization and you can find it
on your free time and you can find it on
the weekend
if you don't know where to start which
tends to be the majority of everyone i
speak to
trust the things that you're curious
about follow the things that you're
interested about
those are your breadcrumbs don't dismiss
them they sometimes feel like there's no
way i could be interested in barbecues
or violin
and next thing you know they lead you to
your quest those are the breadcrumbs
trust them
and if they scare you
that is so good
because what scares us most is most
often what we most need to do
take paul graham
the co-founder of white combinator the
most sought after startup accelerator in
the world who said it seems in order to
do really big things
you need to start by doing deceptively
small things
so whether your quest is an
entrepreneurial one or not i urge you to
start today
don't wait
because if everyone had a purpose
no matter how small
the world would be a better place for us
all thank you
[Applause]
you
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