Starting a business is not only about seeing opportunity and taking it, it involves a lot of risk taking on the entrepreneurs side. For example when I started my company I took R500 from my school registration fees and payed for my domain registration and other business costs. The problem was not taking chances, the problem was in getting the money back in time to register at school. If it wasn’t for a dear friend of mine I don’t think I was going to register at school for the that semester. Some people might say that was a stupid move why risk like that?
The problem is if you are afraid of taking chances and putting everything you have on the line to chase your dreams, it will never be anything more than
just that “A Dream”. What I always tell myself is “if you have a dream and you don’t give your best to chase it, that dream is as useless as a nightmare”.

Nightmares only serve the purpose of scaring us and nothing more, and for some entrepreneurs their dreams are exactly that nightmares all they do is scare them, whether you are afraid of leaving your job to build your company, renting bigger office because you think you won’t be able to make rent payments, some stay small forever because they are afraid to learn new things and increase their business. Some are afraid to talk or telling people about your dreams because you are afraid they won’t support you. I decided to research 5 fears a entrepreneur will need to conquer before starting a business and write about them so that you can also know them and be able to take chances for your dreams or ideas and they are:

1. Getting broke – Money is one of the biggest concerns most entrepreneurs have, and with good reason too. Starting  a business requires a lot of money, which sometimes comes directly from the entrepreneur’s pockets or the pockets of independent investors. And for most those investors happen to be their loved ones which is bad if the business fails or you run out of money, you will disappoint them and even worse is loosing your life savings or last money. If that is the reason why you are afraid of making that first step you can always find other means of funding like crowdfunding to collect small amounts from thousands of people, or seek business grants from the government to help get you started. But most of all you need to believe in yourself and dream because if you don’t then you shouldn’t chase them or go into business.
2. Being incompetent – most people don’t believe in themselves and end worried that they might not be good enough as an entrepreneur or that their product isn’t good enough to be competitive in the market. The fear of not being good enough can be debilitating for new entrepreneurs, now you have to remember a simple concept that applies to all businesses: launching with a minimum viable product. Your product doesn’t have to be perfect when it first launches and it doesn’t have to be the best, it just has to be acceptable. from there you’ll have plenty of room to make improvements to it over time. No product ever starts out perfect, some of the greatest businesses in the world probably started with a product of similar quality to yours.
3. Failing – The fear of failure gets the better of all of us occasionally. There are small failures such as customers ordering and not paying or customers paying first and you not delivering in time, or your company going under. Failure will set you back no matter what but you can’t let the fear of failure stop you from making a decision, more important failures are learning opportunities. Every failure you experience yields a lesson you can incorporate into your business or life.
4. Being overwhelmed – The entrepreneurial life isn’t chosen because it’s easy, you choose it because of the challenge and rewards it holds along the way. If you’re getting into entrepreneurship because it seems like an easy way to get rich quick someone has lied to you, entrepreneurship is riddled with obstacles, stress and hard work but the good side about it is control. Yes you will inevitably feel overwhelmed at times but it’s all completely within your power to change. If your dealing with financial problems you can hire a financial adviser, if you are not getting the results you want out of a project you can abort it and start a new one or get someone else to run it for you.
5. Fear of the unknown – Well this is indescribable and impossible to prepare for, when you first get started with a business plan, a bit of money and maybe a partner or mentor by your side, you’ll have no idea what to expect in your first year. For many it’s a thrilling thought but it’s also terrifying. Entrepreneurship isn’t a job but a lifestyle you choosing to be in this role because you’re a risk-taker, you’re passionate, you work hard and you believe in your idea or dream. Those qualities are more than enough to conquer any obstacle that gets in your way even the unknown ones so put those fears to rest and believe in yourself.

In conclusion as an entrepreneur you don’t have to be perfect, you can also start as minimum viable product. You don’t have to make all the right decisions and you don’t need to be a perfect leader, you just have to be passable until you have the time and experience to improve yourself. You will experience ridiculous workload than you would in a 9 to 5 or 5 to 5 job but you’ll be in full control of your own destiny. Entrepreneurship isn’t for the fearless it’s for the dreamers that are prepared to work hard to make their dreams come true and people strong enough to learn from their mistakes with the ability to feed from their fears and learn from them.