Personal Relationships, big visions, and discouragement

[Kyle Curtin]

Your mindset is heavily influenced by who you surround yourself with & take advice from.

Mostly everyone has heard this before, but I want to stress something that affects all of us at one point or another.

This is being discouraged by others when you tell them your vision.

I have realized that you have to be extremely careful with who you tell your vision/dreams to. If you tell it to folks who have already reached a level of mentality or success at which you aspire, they will most likely encourage the crap out of you and egg you on and encourage you to go bigger because they know it’s possible and that you can do it.

Unfortunately, when you try to tell the same thing to someone who you may be extremely close to and potentially even hold a relationship with (ex. friends, family, significant other, etc.) and whom you want to tell everything to but may not be in the same sphere, you may get a drastically different response from them.

You may hear that it is unrealistic, they may be upset or angry with you for thinking so large, etc. and sometimes it can be very discouraging and you question if it is worth trying because you value their opinion.

From what I have personally came across myself, as well as hearing similar stories from others, these people most likely aren’t acting out of a place of negativity or jealously etc. but out of fear for you.

These people that may be very close to you likely aren’t in that business/investing sphere and are scared for you because you are taking a risk in something untraditional that they know very little about and putting money on the line that could potentially be lost.

The thing that is a little hard to understand is that these folks most likely have your best interest at heart and want nothing but what is good for you, but sometimes it is not what you need to hear. There is nothing wrong with them, you are just taking a risk that is not “normal” by society’s standards and doesn’t conform with the normal “40hr/week W2 job until you retire” type of mentality. Not everyone will be open minded to you willingly throwing your hat in the ring to try for bigger things.

I have realized that you can only have conversations about vision and dreams and lots of entrepreneurial “what if?” statements etc. with folks who understand that mentality and will encourage you to keep pushing. You can’t always have them with people who you may really be connected/friendly/love, because even though your relationship may be very strong, they may not understand your mentality and may give you a different kind of opinion and it might discourage you because you care for them and their opinion.

Mindset can be challenging to maintain especially when you are discouraged by the folks who you truly care about. But they do not react out of negative intention, but positive fear for your safety and well being. Not everyone is going to understand what you want to do in the bigger picture.

What do you think about this?