The biggest spiritual challenge of your life is opening a business

By many alternative thinkers starting your own business is associated with capitalism, ambition, materialism and "success". This certainly has a lot to do with it but there is much more to it than that. I can confirm as I've been working on my own startup for over a year now. We are making a web site where users can recommend web sites within their self defined area of expertise.

It should have been ready several months back, but we're not there yet. I can assure you that it is a challenge and that your self esteem, your ideas and values, your courage, persistence and mental and emotional stability are being tested. See some of the spiritual issues I faced:

• People don't like your idea or think it's unrealistic. Disapproval is hard for the ego and as the entrepreneur you need to be strong an keep going.
• There are so many things to do and not enough money and time to do them. We have these same challenges in every day life with a normal job, but in the case of a normal job you can much easier say "that's not my problem" or "I work from 9 to 5" or "that's the risk my boss is taking, I'm not responsible from that if it goes wrong".
• It's your own money that's invested and it might never come back. This tests your relationship with money, believe me … it makes you reflect.
• Plan A proves to be wrong, so does plan B … do you have the creativity and persistence to come up with plan C?
• There are always new things you need to do that you never did. Do you believe you can do it? If there's always work to do, can you take time of for yourself to relax, enjoy and be conscious of what is?
• There's not much chance to hide in case things don't go well. It's you who is in charge and will have to deal with all consequences .... even if you can come up with an excuse why it's not your fault. So? ... what do you do about it? It really learns you to accept responsibility.

I can keep going on with this list. It all comes down to emotional and spiritual maturity. I think many entrepreneurs have learned a lot on a personal level while starting their own business. But at least as many have left these intense learning go by. I believe I'm growing a lot with it, but there's still plenty I can improve. I like the challenge, although regularly I have a down moment and think of easier things to do. Thank god that I don't let these moments keep me down and I go after it again. These challenges are faced in the social sector as well. Anything new that has to be put up is a big challenge and a great moment for learning and growing personally. I can recommend it to anyone.