Entrepreneurship looks so glamorous online, doesn’t it? Like every post screams “freedom”, someone on a laptop in Bali, a busy parent running an at-home business just sipping an iced latte while playing with their kid, a person on a private jet bragging about “six-figure months” and “scaling fast.” You can type in “entrepreneurship” or even “girl boss” into Pinterest, Instagram, TikTok, or even Google Images, and you’ll find those flashy pictures and flashy posts. But in the real world?
Well, it’s more like working from a messy kitchen table surrounded by receipts, snacks, and a dying laptop battery. It might be kids screaming in the background while you deal with a headache. Oh, and instead of that dreamy “CEO energy,” it’s probably just panicking all the time. But this is what being a business owner is. Yeah, plus it’s not like this is the side of entrepreneurship anyone would want to put on Instagram.
The unfiltered, unedited, “oh great, the client hasn’t paid yet and rent’s due tomorrow” kind of reality. Yeah, it’s scary, it’s also frustrating, but knowing the real side of being a business owner doesn’t mean you’re failing or anything like that.
The Instagram/ TikTok Dream vs. Reality
Hands down, everyone online loves the fantasy version. Well, you know the one, it’s the private jets, designer bags, endless “business meetings” that somehow happen poolside. It’s all very inspirational, but it’s not really all that real (if at all for regular small business owners). The reality is more like eating lunch at your desk, missing invoices, and Googling tutorials in the middle of the night when work hours should have been over.
Yeah, it’s a lot of unglamorous work. Like, you’re juggling everything, be it sales, marketing, taxes, customer service, and oh, trying to have a life somewhere in there. But is this failure? No, no, it’s really not. It’s not fun, sure, but that’s what actual business looks like. The people who make it aren’t living some luxury fantasy; they’re just better at surviving the boring stuff.
The Freedom is in the Boring Stuff
You know what nobody tells you? Like, you barely ever see anyone online mention it; it’s that freedom doesn’t come from constant hustle; it comes from structure. It comes from just being organised and level-headed. It comes from having a team that has high morale (and not expecting free AI tools to do it all), it comes from payroll services, it comes from having someone help you with finances like an accountant or bookkeeper, it comes from not penny-pinching, it comes from not wasting money, and it comes from not stressing over the fact that you don’t have a flashy.
You don’t need to do business meetings in a jet, you don’t need to sit in first class, you don’t need to type away in a fancy Dubai airport lounge, you don’t need a Rolex watch, basically, nothing flashy. Those don’t signal actual success (no matter how much it’s supposedly pushed that this all is success).
It’s Better to be “Boring”
Nobody wants to hear it, but the dream isn’t the wild hustle. The dream is the boring business that works quietly in the background. It’s that stability, it’s that long, but steady growth, it’s not booming, there’s probably no fat stacks, but everything is predictable, it’s steady, it’s safe, which is honestly the most important aspect of them all. Seriously, ignore what the tech bros and influencers on LinkedIn are saying, because entrepreneurship isn’t about chasing excitement and fast gains, it really isn’t.