When Is The Time Right?

When is it time to move into what they call "full time entrepreneurship"? You hear it all the time across the small business blogging world and in small business magazines. But what does that really mean -- a full time entrepreneur? Is it marked by 50 or more hour work weeks? Living on your ability to market your idea and your business well? Is it when you are already bringing in money with your vision or dream? Here I sit, almost one year into my residence in Bozeman, Montana and only a bit closer to the main goal of opening Cafe Evoke. We have made great strides and fallen 3 steps back several times. Can I call myself a full time entrepreneur? I have worked 40 or more hours a week on Cafe Evoke while working 40 hours a week for a different employer. Can I call myself a full time entrepreneur? I am living pay check to pay check and relying on my business planning and forecasting to help support my family. Can I call myself an entrepreneur? Cafe Evoke Catering and ultimately Cafe Evoke will be serving its first cup of coffee this Saturday. It is a day I have been waiting for more than a year now. I look back on the first posts of this blog and remember where I was sitting -- the same desk, the same chair, the same lamps turned on, even the same candle and coffee mug sitting next to me -- and wonder if I have finally become this "entrepreneur" I have been writing about. Maybe entrepreneurship is a trait, a feeling or goal. If that is the case, I feel that I have demonstrated that well. But when will it be time to truly jump from the dock? To take that first plunge into the deep end of calculated risk? I have so far been holding on to my job and pay check in order to take care of my wife and set us up for a successful future but the time of talking is soon to be over. When will I know that the time has come? I have been feeling the pressures of holding a full time job and owning Cafe Evoke Catering as I have about 1 hour each day to make phone calls and get "stuff" done. It is frustrating to have a "to-do" list that keeps rolling over week after week. My ability to be true to my word of responding to emails and phone messages within 24 hours has lapsed and it is hard for me to put myself to sleep at night. This is entrepreneurship. It is the hard work and determination that will lead to a successful future. The ground work must be done properly and it is not easy. Luckily, we are almost out of that phase for now. When will I quite my job and work solely on Cafe Evoke Catering? I think when that time comes, I will know. Until then, back to work I go. ..be bold Tagged: Cafe Evoke, Cafe Evoke Catering, entrepreneurship, coffee, espresso