by Joel Comm, author of “The Fun Formula: How Curiosity, Risk-Taking, and Serendipity Can Revolutionize How You Work“
When you’re starting out as an entrepreneur, there are so many questions. What should I build? How do I sell it? Where do I find the funding? How much money can I make?
They’re all important questions, vital even. But there’s one more question that’s even more important and it’s too often ignored.
Why should I do it?
The question looks too simple to consider. You’re doing it for the money, of course. But if money was the goal, you’d have plenty of other options and many of them would be a lot easier. Every entrepreneur hopes to strike a seam of riches but if a big house and a fast car is the goal, there are quicker and safer routes to that destination than running your own business. Just ask anyone on Wall Street.
So maybe it’s the challenge. There is something incredibly satisfying about setting yourself a goal, drawing up a plan and putting in the work to make it happen. The feeling when you get there is incredible.
But there’s a better reason to be an entrepreneur. There’s a better reason to do whatever it is that you choose to do: because it’s fun!
Life is supposed to be fun. We should be enjoying ourselves. We should be carpe-ing all the diems because we’re only gifted so many of them. The old saying about finding work you love and you’ll never work another day of your life has real meaning. When you’re doing what you should be doing, when your activities are in line with your gifts and your abilities and the pursuits you want to follow, you feel it. Everything clicks. You head into the office every morning with joy in your heart excited to start the day. Weekends are always good but when work is fun, the great stuff starts on Monday morning.
And not only should you enjoy what you’re building but that’s also when you have the most success. I’ve built a number of different businesses in a number of different fields, but my best results have always come from projects that started with the biggest laughs. When, in the first days of the App Store, someone at my company suggested that we use the world’s whizziest piece of technology to create a digital whoopee cushion, the laughter at the meeting could have been heard halfway down the street.
But iFart Mobile went on to become a sensation, topping the charts and generating seven-figure downloads. We didn’t know that was going to happen. We didn’t expect it to happen. But we did believe that if we enjoyed what we were doing, other people would enjoy it too.
The same thing happened when a friend asked me to help him create a podcast about the blockchain. It was supposed to be a bit of fun, a way for both of us to explore a topic that we both found interesting and wanted to learn. We did it together, publicly, and thousands of people came with us for the ride. It’s been a blast.
That’s always how business works.
When you’re enjoying yourself, you don’t feel that you’re working. But your work has the biggest impact.
So the real question to ask when you’re starting to build a business isn’t “What should I build?” or “How much can I make?” It’s “What do I love?” “What do I enjoy the most?” “What gives me the greatest fun?”
No one can answer that question for you. We all have different tastes. For some people fun is driving a fast car. For others, it’s building a website or baking cupcakes. Whatever you enjoy though, you’re likely to find that there’s also a way to turn that fun into a business. There will be a path that takes you from interest to income.
It might not appear to be massive income, and it might look like it’s going to take time. But because you’re enjoying it, it won’t feel like work. You’ll keep going. You’ll keep growing. You’ll keep raising your income until you find that not only are you enjoying yourself more than you thought possible at work, but you’re also making more money than you thought possible from something you love to do.
Entrepreneurs always have a million and one different ways to build a business. But when fun is your guiding light, you can look forward to more success, a higher income… and a big, permanent smile.
Joel Comm is the New York Times best-selling author of thirteen books, including The AdSense Code, Click Here to Order, KaChing, and Twitter Power 3.0. He has appeared in the New York Times, on Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show, on CNN online, on FOX News, and many other places. His newest book is “The Fun Formula: How Curiosity, Risk-Taking, and Serendipity Can Revolutionize How You Work“.
