The Startup Magazine Entrepreneurial Spirit, by the Cirion Group

“Get busy living, or get busy dying… I find I am so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it is the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain…” ~Red, Shawshank Redemption

There is just something amazing about the entrepreneurial spirit. Something that says you can go out there and do anything. Might be difficult, might be hard—but it can be done. There is a great freedom found in chasing the horizon with wind in your sails. We’re all going to end up dying sooner or later. Might as well accept that fact now and get to livin’.

Think for a minute back to the beginning of one of your journeys? Where were you going? What were you doing? Who were you with? If only we could bottle the emotions built up from the excitement and nervous tingling we feel at the outset of our long journeys. We know there are going to be long hardships and tough battles, and yet we still cannot hold back the excitement. It is almost as if the sheer knowledge of potential doom and an uncertain future makes the adventure that much more exciting. Couple that with a realistic knowledge of how hard the journey will be and a vision of where you are going, and you have a team ready to take on the world.

We recently had the opportunity to watch a DVD that documented the travels of two friends on motorbikes all across the globe. On two separate trips, they travelled from Scotland to New York (through Europe, Asia, and the Road of Bones in Russia) and then Scotland to Cape Town. Without a doubt, they were excited as ever about the opportunity to ride their motorbikes through some of the most remote parts of the world. That excitement and vision is what carried them forward initially. And when shallow waters came, it was their realistic expectations of the harsh journey that had prepared them to wade those challenges. But when it was taking them 17 hours to travel 10 miles and getting stuck in mud and eating strange Mongolian food, it was their camaraderie as brothers that carried them through.

Without a doubt, the excitement and passion at the beginning of a journey is what carries us forward into the unknown. But what carries us through is not only having realistic expectations of the journey, but also knowing we are there with a team that is completely abandoned for the same vision.

And when we successfully reach the other side, after having traversed the harsh terrain and raging waters, the tough times become only a memory. A memory that we look back on and laugh about together. A memory that teaches us to learn from our mistakes and push through the hard times. A memory that reminds us not to give up. But most of all, a memory of those people standing beside us as we went through the gauntlet together.

And thus begins the entrepreneurial spirit.

Cirion Group LLC
Cirion Group is a strategic consulting firm out of Athens, GA. They strive to take ideas and make them reality by empowering small business owners and entrepreneurs and helping manage their process of growth. Check out more at www.ciriongroup.com.