Zucchinis and Overwhelm
Let me lay down some truth right now: there is no difference between zucchinis and overwhelm. Look up overwhelm in the dictionary and there should be a whole-page drawing of a zucchini.
You start with one teeny tiny seed and forty-two seconds later you have behemoth zukes taking over the whole yard. They’ve gotta have some Gremlin DNA because you add a little water and *BAM* they turn into MONSTERS and start spawning new zucchinis everywhere! (I’ve switched from Little Mermaid to 80s movie references this week.)
Like the zucchini gone wild, the wild adventure of starting an online business can be overwhelming.
Some people have said that it’s all the internet and tech stuff that keeps them from leaping, but often that’s only part of the equation.
MAYBE IT’S NOT THE INTERNET THAT’S HOLDING YOU BACK?
For all its glory, the internet is not just limitless kitten photos, what-the-frick-am-I-supposed-to-do-with-all-this-damned-zucchini Instapot recipes, and opportunity. There are some downsides.
There are additional obstacles for Intuitive Introverts (those whose Myers-Briggs type begins with “IN”).
The Personality Junkie blog—also written by IN types—published this series on why these types can struggle in the modern world (one built for the 75% of the population that are Sensors rather than Intuitives). The points made are all so salient. The speed and sheer scope of our changing world can cause some real problems. The internet is the biggest contributing force in modern times.
But when it comes to whether you start an online business, maybe it’s not the internet itself that has you resisting grabbing your whens, wheres, and hows by the cajones—but the feeling of overwhelm about business in general.
A LOT OF INTROVERTS THINK OF BUSINESS AS BEING, WELL, KINDA… ICKY.
This is a mistaken belief. It’s one that’s shaped by the extrovert-is-best narrative that introverts struggle to fit into. We associate sales with a “say or do anything for the bottom line” type of schmoozing, instead of associating it with being of service.
Offering something to someone who wants or needs it is not icky. It’s helpful.
If you’re doing it right, business should feel good. Human firecracker, Ash Ambirge, of The Middle Finger Project is known to talk about selling as helping. And she’s absofuckinglutely right.
You are not ripping anyone off when you offer them a service or product that improves their life in some way. You are not taking advantage of anyone. You’re not threatening to give someone a pair of concrete shoes and throw them into piranha-infested waters. You’re just giving them a choice.
If someone takes a customer’s money and doesn’t offer equal value in return, then they’re a jagoff. But that ain’t you, toots! I know it.
The kind of business I’m talking about here is reciprocal. If you offer someone a fantastic service or product and they choose to pay you for it, it’s a beautiful, human exchange of value for value.
OVERWHELM AND HIGH-REACTIVE BRAINS
There’s a famous longitudinal study lead by psychologist Jerome Kagan that followed participants from infancy into young adulthood to determine whether temperament traits are inborn (nature vs. nurture of personality). There is so much juice in that research! One of the key takeaways is what being a high-reactive infant means for said infant’s future personality.
The high-reactive wee folk were observed to have a stronger response to unfamiliar sensory stimuli than their low-reactive counterbabies. Things like loud noises, sour tastes, and unfamiliar faces caused them to flail and yell. Turns out there is a correlation between these high-reactives and introversion in adulthood.
High-reactive introverts have an innnnnnntimate relationship with their amygdala. This is that ancient part of our brain that screams, “RUN, Y’BITCH!” when the prehistoric megafauna (like giant lion/wombat mashups with opposable thumbs 😱) got snacky and thought your thigh bone looked like a lovely little amuse-bouche.
Because their brains are more sensitive, high-reactives can be more easily overwhelmed—especially in loud, or otherwise abrasive environments. While being able to control your whens, wheres, and hows enables you to be muuuuuch more selective, owning a business can still be overstimulating at times. More than one introvert I know has let the fear of this potentiality prevent them from jumping in.
I get it. I was one of those high-reactive type tykes. A cursory glance at my baby photos will provide all the evidence needed.
Y’see, I was one. chonky. baby. I looked like a flour sack with eyeballs. That wombat-lion would’ve given my little knee rolls a five-star review on Zomato. It turned out I was sensitive to my baby formula—it was too rich. I was switched to a leaner option, slimmed down so that I only had one set of chubby baby cheeks, and was entirely adorable. Obvs.
I’m a still high-reactive. I’m whatever the opposite of an adrenaline junkie is. I’m a being half comatose on a massage table junkie. I take risks, for sure. But they’re the kind of risks that keep all hands, arms, feet, and legs inside the ride at all times.
Running a business, though, is one of my core personal projects. It’s one of the areas where I am willing to act in contrast to my core personality some of the time.
HONEY, I SHRUNK YOUR MOTIVATION
Some introverts (those Intuitive types again) avoid entrepreneurship because they dread the boredom of doing repetitive work that doesn’t groove with their deeper motivations. I’m not going to pretend this isn’t a real hurdle sometimes. I’d be lying and I would never do you dirty like that, my friend!
There are mundane parts of running your own business. Bills. Invoicing. Tech updates. Bookkeeping. And in my case, shelving reference books so they don’t tumble onto my head, causing my gruesome-though-poetic untimely death.
Sometimes these nitty-gritty details really do trigger a desire to rip out my eyelashes.
BUT, there are things that we can do to lighten that load. Things like delegating that work to those strange, mystical folks who rather enjoy it. A virtual assistant or an intern might be a good choice depending on your biz.
Batching routine types of work is also super helpful. I call it Bitchy Batchy Band-Aid Hour (because it rarely takes longer than an hour when batched). I hate it and there’s definitely some internal whining, but when I get it over with, it’s never as bad as I’d thought. Like pulling off a really boring Band-Aid.
BEING YOURSELF IN YOUR BUSINESS
If there’s one thing I’d love for you to take away from all this, it’s the truth that running a business can—and should—work in tandem with being yourself. They’re not mutually exclusive.
Overwhelm happens. There’s truth that introverts can be predisposed to it. But it doesn’t have to call all the shots. You can bolster yourself against it when you work in service of the things that light your butt on fire.
Being an entrepreneur isn’t for everyone, and that’s okay. But if any of the above reasons have been holding you back, maybe consider giving the idea another looksy?
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