So far in my entrepreneurial journey, I’ve had my hopes dashed twice. I’m not sure if this is common but I presume it is.

I learned that cold-calling potential customers is hard work, after having my first attempt conclude successfully with a respectable order of 125 units and thinking, “I’m made in the shade!” That, I now realize, was “beginner’s luck.” I’ve not let this deter me as I really enjoy meeting with potential clients and learning their opinions. I am always up for a challenge and hearing new ideas for my craft.

I have never been one to follow the crowd. If I were that type of person, you’d find me on ETSY and Shopify. I’d also be emailing potential clients instead of arriving on their doorstep, unannounced. Both fortunately and unfortunately, that’s not my way. My path has always been hand-hewn.

I believe my body was born about 50 years later than my soul. That might be an advantage over having them born together, as I arrived in this world in a female package and would likely have found my path more difficult in the 1960’s. I enjoy living “Old School.” Fortunate enough to have been born and raised in the country on a 400-acre dairy farm, where to see my friends, I HAD to go to school every day. No hooky for me. Being alone (unless you count my two older brothers,) meant that, between many chores, I had to create my own fun and I developed a keen sense of wonder for the green space around me. To this day, I’d rather be sitting on a rock pile, made from clearing the farm fields for planting, breathing in the sweet air and listening for other signs of breathing life. This I find far more pleasurable to freely spending someone else’s $1000, at a mall or boutique… not that that’s EVER happened, mind you – My imagination does tend to get away from me… Rein it in SUE! 🙂

I do not find myself glued to my new mobile phone and thankfully have not contracted the dreaded FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) disease – yet. My phone is my camera and as such is always nearby to enable me to take the relevant shots I need for my too irregular posts on social media. I’ve yet to learn the nuances required to make my pages and website noticed among millions of others -Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is on my list of learning requirements and I will get on that soonest. Currently, with the ‘Block’ styling I use with my wordpress site – instead of ‘Document’ styling, I’m told by the lovely people at wordpress, when I pay for private help, that SEO does not work . Only the “Excerpt” that I craft will be viewed word for word by the monstrously powerful analytical data-crunching computers used by companies such as Google. Who am I kidding? Only Google is relevant in this field of operation. Any other company is less than a blip on the radar.

In the past few days, I’ve realized, again, that hard work and perseverance are easily more important than sheer luck. To succeed, I must trust in my own actions and allow my old soul to do the guiding, and not rely on an external source for producing my success. I’ll not dismiss potential opportunities but I’ll have to feel in my gut that these opportunities are right for me and my business – still in infancy.

I have a ‘child’ to nourish, after all… Most nights with 3-4 hours of sleep, and questions requiring immediate answers. (That reminds me, I think I noticed 2 messages from my Aussie packaging company in my inbox requiring immediate attention. They work as I sleep. Why not Vistaprint? Please refer previous paragraphs.) I do not contend with drippy noses, teething, diapers requiring attention or trips to our wonderful Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario, affectionately referred to as CHEO.

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Until next time, I do hope your household is filled with the joy of children’s laughter and not the heart-rending sounds of teething.

Sue, the Axe-Man, and The Fancifulls of Oh Valley