Over the year I’ve alluded to these posts being mental vomit. Yeah you might be able to recognize the corn you ate at lunch, but there’s a lot of mismatched gunk and always an aftertaste. Today is a little different. I’ve been thinking about this post for a record three days…in a row. This is a record mostly because I can’t remember anything that long as well as it implies planning. Implies is the key word here.
On June 8th of 2018 I was driving down a thoroughfare of Baton Rouge. Think, road you travel everyday. I had a stream of thoughts and the next morning (I think) I wrote this post >>> CLICK ME. This started a maelstrom of texts, a couple calls and a lot of thank yous. Apparently I’d struck a common point among a lot of people and sharing that resonated.
Over the next few months I wrote a little more and then in January, I dug in and really started writing a lot. One of these days (for real) I’ll organize this blog so that you can go back and easily read the posts. Some are great. Some are okay. Some just are. With distance I’ve become proud of 99% of them, shit maybe all of them. I’d have to go back and read them to know.
I never started out to chronicle depression and the conversation on mental health was never a cause of mine. Mostly I was having some of this conversation with myself, in public, out loud for everyone to read. Okay, that sounds like a crazy person.
What I’ve come to find out (and secretly thought inside) is that we are all a little crazy and that’s just how it is. You’ve resonated with the crazy because it feels good for someone you know to say the things that make you question everything, “Out Loud”. Me speaking them into existence makes us both a little less crazy and for a moment makes it okay.
Then the next day comes. And the next. And the next. Ups and downs and life keep coming at us because that’s what the universe or whatever you prescribe to does. It never relents. Some people think they are the victims of this, which makes them so, and others keep moving along, oblivious. Falling into the latter doesn’t make me immune. This at least let’s me not fall into the “Why does this always happen to me!?” mentality. As I love to say. Nothing happens for a reason. Things happen. We apply the reasons. I’d like to add to this. When we decide ahead of time that bad things always happen. Thdey usually always do.
I know I’ve written ad nauseum about why I stop writing and such. Today I’m going to share another real reason.
I over share and it can be a burden on my family and friends. They question why I don’t just come to them to talk about the things I write about instead of publicly airing my grievances against myself. I don’t have a great answer for that. It’s likely part attention grabbing and part the fake anonymity of it. Typing and hitting send isn’t the same as looking someone in the eye and saying “I’m fucked up about this and I don’t know what to do.” I’m always jarred, uncomfortable and a little embarrassed by a person I know or barely know approaching me and saying they liked or appreciated these writings. It’s like I forgot I bared my soul at breakfast and now I’ve got to choke down a little piece of egg I just burped up.
For every post that makes it out, there’s one or two a week that don’t and that’s because they are too much. Either too negative or too revealing or both. While I’ve never said it out loud, I’ve kind of vowed to myself to not complain here. Jokingly, okay, sometimes. But never just the toxic stuff I sometimes think. Most times I don’t even bother putting it down because I know it won’t see the light of day. But we have to get it out right? You can’t just keep jamming 10 then 20 then 30lbs of shit into that 5lb bag and think the seams are going to keep it in, so every once in a while. I let it out.
As you probably know I am the owner of a couple of businesses. One, FRESHJUNKIE Racing is really doing well thanks to a team of great business partners and I am so very thankful for this. Over the past year, I have had two other restaurants close. This and the death of my dad, have put an enormous amount of pressure on me and have been the cause of damn near all of my depressive episodes over the last year.
Failures are supposed o be these great learning opportunities, so say the oracles of entrepreneurship, but that is a lie. Failures crush your confidence and make you question everything. Of course you should learn from that at some point, but when you’re buried up to your neck, the thought of digging out is beyond your scope of reasonable options. You keep breathing and if you’re really optimistic you start wiggling your fingers, with hope that the dirt will begin to loosen and that you’ll keep breathing. Baby steps.
Armed with this back story, last week I was overwhelmed with what to do to increase business at my two existing stores and was close to just throwing in the towel. Frustration was bubbling over and I was at my office late at night working through everything.
I have long thought about putting out a podcast about what it’s really like being a business owner/entrepreneur. Part Start Up, part way to vent. I never do. Last week this was the intro I wrote to an episode. I share it today because it’s part of why I don’t write everyday. It feels toxic and hopeless and standing alone, it is hard to read. When I get like this. I don’t write, and this is why there’s a lapse in posts.
I’ve been sitting here with mics and mixers and ideas for a couple of years. Sitting while things seem to burn down around me at times, doing nothing. Days, weeks and months of doing the same things and expecting the different outcomes. Pouring in money and hoping.
I think “there’s a podcast or an idea I should record”...a story to tell, something worth saying that’s worth people hearing. Tell them about me! Yet I record nothing. I sit quietly, as it all seems to implode around me. Waiting, hemorrhaging money and hope. Waiting for more people to come in, so crippled by the daily panic of the day that I really don’t even know what to do.
I thought I could just press record and the words would come out, but that’s naive. You hit record with nothing written and you get just what you’d think. Dead air. Nothing just happens. You have to go get it. You have to make things happen.
I’m not religious but I say things like “god if you make ‘x’ happen, I’ll do ‘y’.” Then “x” does and I fail to follow through. Again.
I used to wake up at 5:00 or so, have coffee then walk out the door to train. I still do, except now it’s usually before 4. 3:47, 3:52, 3:38 this week. I look at my watch and the overwhelming panic washes over me before the light from my watch dims. I get up, feed the dogs, turn on the coffee ahead of the timer I set and sit on the couch.
It’s weird how you can feel like your heart is racing when in fact, your pulse is 43. I’ve been an endurance athlete all of my life and it has cardiac benefits, a low resting pulse being #1. I may also have heart cavity walls thicker than a two by four. Give and take I guess.
No one sees this side. Not many people know I walk around on the verge of panic and losing everything. This story is what happens inside one guy. A so called “serial entrepreneur”, an “overachiever”, a “change agent”. The guy a lot of people think they may want to be.
For 20 years, or maybe forever, I’ve zigged when others zagged. I’ve ignored best practices and done it my way, I’ve said “yes we can” to damn near everything. Today, I’m 48 and seemingly 2 bad business days away from collapse at all times. AT ALL TIMES. This is because of an unwillingness to quit combined with not knowing how to quit.
On any given day, i’ll solve it all, decide I’m done, and decide I’ll be fine, then know I can’t possibly recover and will cycle through 4-5 more “things I’m sure about”. I think, “if they only knew about our stores,” then I don’t tell them. I say to myself, “I’d dig ditches, I’ll work 24-7, I’ll do whatever.” Then I don’t have the energy to open the mail.
This is being an entrepreneur. This is being an entrepreneur the worst way. This is working for yourself and getting to wear shorts and a t-shirt everyday. This is wanting to die, but not really. Plus, dying is a terrible financial plan.
So I wake up, I panic, I go about my day. I make miniscule change, I likely drink a little too much, then I go to bed to do it all over again tomorrow. Anyone want to be an entrepreneur???
I don’t share this with anyone, so now I share it with everybody. I’m not sure why other than I’m going to burst if I don’t get relief.
I hit save and then left the office. Nothing recorded.
Over the next couple of days I was able to get through things, but my dread didn’t improve. I wasn’t sure I’d keep things open through the week. I kept this to myself. As I do.
If you’ve gotten this far with me, I’d like to thank you. I’ve spewed forth a lot, and it’s probably confusing. So what is this post even about?
It’s about resilience and belief in yourself. It’s about stepping outside. It’s about how just when you think there’s little hope. Hope arrives. Hope was there all along.
On Monday I got a call from a long time business partner and friend, that he had spoken to a guy who loved my concept and who had experience in the space. He wondered what my growth strategies were etc. When your buried in that up to your neck hole, growth strategy is the last thing on your mind. Despite the struggle, I’m still an optimist and I believe in what I do, even at the lowest. So I of course agreed to meet.
Without boring you with all the details, this simple meeting did more to refocus and rejuvenate my belief than just about anything. I have a great concept, the product is multiple levels above the competition . Not enough people know about it. Period. That my friends, is not a colossal failure of self. It’s a fucking marketing equation.
One vote of confidence, from a stranger, is all it took to flip a switch inside. To remind me of how great what I have built is. To remind me of the dedication of employees and customers. That what we have built means more than a place to get lunch. It’s given me back my focus, and confidence. My circumstances remain the same. My mindset has flipped.
I started out a post a few months ago that said “good news, you aren’t clinically depressed, you’re episodic depressed. “. It was about the difference between people who have daily, crippling depression and those that have the same thing, but it’s tied to a specific event. I’m not a psychologist so fucking lighten up if I’m getting the real world diagnosis wrong. You get the point. An event starts you down a hole. You double down on it. And triple down. And quadruple, and all in and the next thing you know you’ve lost your confidence and direction and your will. Make no mistake. It can go on for years and therefore probably looks just like clinical depression (or whatever the term is). If something goes on for long enough, it becomes the norm. This has been mine for a bit.
Yesterday I made a simple post about the power of a bike ride that changed my outlook. I woke up as usual but while riding, I was flooded with optimism and damn near joy. I made some realizations about some of the things I’d been doing during my daily life that need adjusting. What’s interesting is that not one thing that was giving me struggle had changed. Except a vote of confidence from someone else the day before and a bike ride.
If you’ve gotten to the end of this. I’ll say thanks. It matters to me. I’ll also end with saying that of course there’s work to do every day to keep the shift in place. Just as depression can double down on itself. So can confidence and belief.
It’s about saying it out loud.
As we roll into the weekend let me be that vote of confidence. Let me be the power from without that you need to shift your mindset.
I believe in you. Now you need to, too.
#hugsandhi5s