Don’t Call Me an Entrepreneur

“Your’e so entrepreneurial”

Don’t Call Me an Entrepreneur“Your’e so entrepreneurial”


“Your’e so entrepreneurial”

What does it mean to be an entrepreneur?

Does it mean you study “it” in school? Does it mean you started a successful business? Does it mean you read all the good books? Do you watch Gary Vaynerchuk videos?

The word has reached peak saturation — and it’s being used all over the place. It’s become popular to become an entrepreneur. In the same way that soul cycle classes were a fad (or still are), so is identifying as an entrepreneur.

It’s a bit irrational of a phenomenon. I have no idea why people think being an “entrepreneur” is a completely positive thing. Building your own business is actually really hard and you have to make a lot of sacrifices to make it happen .

This is a common case of culture misaligning with reality. Hype is overcoming mundane life.

Why complain and spend time writing about this? What is that going to do besides contribute to the bubble?

I wasted a lot of time with distractions, I do not want others to do the same.

People are capitalizing off of this want for people to explore entrepreneurship. That is business. Good for them (the people making the money). But it’s not great for the average joe.

Speakers are motivating millions of people to choose a path that is probably sub-optimal for them. Cities are pouring literally hundreds of millions of dollars into becoming the next tech capital of *insert next region here*. Colleges are convincing students to join clubs, attend lectures, LEARN by watching what it means to be an entrepreneur.

“Watch shark tank, you’ll learn all about real venture capital and entrepreneurship”

“Buy tickets for $hundreds to attend x startup conference — you’ll learn about entrepreneurship”

“Spend $68,000/yr to attend university and read books about entrepreneurship”

No. This culture is actually bad.

Not everyone should start their own business. Not everyone, if they did start their own business, would be successful. I do not know if I would again…maybe.

Stop calling me an Entrepreneur. Stop telling me about entrepreneurship.

Just go out — and do something. Nothing else matters. The rest are really distractions. Focus.


Thanks for reading 🙂

tweet me @jrdngonen

or email me jordangonen1 at gmail dot com

By jordangonen on September 18, 2016.

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Exported from Medium on February 17, 2018.