RE: 🤯When Stress Takes Over Your Life🤯
Well, for our own conversations, you know I know what you're dealing with. I wish I had some kind of sage advice to give you, but I suspect each situation is different and how we deal with it is different. You at least have a business that has some clientele and thus some value, so selling it, even at a loss is an option, from what you've said.
From there, it's probably wrapping your head around working for someone else, and then where and when to start that. Your personal finances will probably have a lot to do with when and possibly where, but also what you know how to do and just how involved you want to get with all of that. If there's any inkling in the back of your head to have another go at a business, or build up the ones you already have going, or spending more time on Steemit, that will all be swirling in your mind.
Tough choices are just that, tough. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, but once you're there, there isn't much choice but to go through it. There is another side, so the light will appear. It just might not be as bright or as welcoming as you might like at first, but that will change in time.
Just as long as you don't beat yourself up over this, or decide you're somehow a failure, you'll get through it soon enough. The more time spent on the negative, the more sleepless nights and the longer the paralysis, I suspect.
Through not giving some sage advice you managed to give some sage advice. :)
Weirdly, I'm still trying to make a go of the thing even if I know that it is doomed. I have the place advertised for sale now though, so we'll see what comes of it all.
It's hard not to beat yourself up over something you've worked so hard on for so long. It's a hit to the self confidence but I'll pull through in the end.
re: beating yourself up
Yeah, it is. That's why I threw it it in there. :) The deal is, it really doesn't do much good. If you feel like there's more you could do to make it work, that's one thing. But if you've basically done all you could to make it work, there's not really anything left.
Some things just aren't meant to be. The next guy could come in and make it work, make it worse, or end up right where you were. What would any of that truly prove about you or your abilities? Some businesses are good fits for particular people and others aren't. Knowledge and drive are only a couple of the characteristics that end up in any of this.
In my case, I never really tried to integrate too much into the towns I served because too many people were too quick to think I was in the pocket of one faction or another as it was. So, I'd basically have to pal around with everyone, and that can take time and still backfire. So, I maintained a professional aloofness that works for a newspaper to a degree, but not necessarily as well for most other businesses.
My boys were growing up during this time and I didn't want them being in the middle of whatever controversies there could be. I didn't need them to hear from others about how bad their dad was for being this or doing that or hanging out with this crowd or that crowd. I also wanted to be with them as they got older and into more things, so if I spent all this time trying to build up goodwill, I would have missed out on a lot of things. In the end, it didn't save the newspapers by doing that, but the papers weren't going to be saved by goodwill, anyway. Not in any meaningful way that I would be interested in continuing with them.
In the end, I don't know if anyone really appreciated what I was doing or not. I know there's not been another newspaper (printed anyway) that has sprung up, and as far as I can tell, no one's taken either online or to a social media page. So, at least in that, I see people recognize the work that went into it.
re: trying to make a go
It's hard to give things up. For me, though, I had exactly the opposite reaction and lived the 'don't give up' deal through the two full-time employees I had. I offered them a chance to have a higher severance payout or keep things going for as long as we could and they opted out for the latter. I knew after the law the state changed kicked in that we weren't ever going to recover, and I was good with that. It was a lot of work to close it down, too—so it wasn't like I was getting out of anything. It was just there wasn't any use trying to fight something that was inevitable.
I guess I could have sued the state over it, received some kind of compensation, but it would have been at the taxpayer expense, and I wasn't about to have that happen, not after all the times that I railed against (and still do) the wasteful spending that goes on. And who needs to hire a lawyer and try to pay them when they're going out of business?
I don't know. I think for the most part, I've moved on. In your case, you have a chance to walk away and still get something out of it. It's your choice, too, even if it doesn't really seem like much of one. And there's bound to be new opportunities awaiting. Surely, there's something you'd like to try that you haven't been able to do yet, or something else that you can focus on doing as a reward for letting go?
Anyway, sorry if none of this helps. I've probably rambled on long enough, though. :)