Anything can be a Business

Rule of Entrerpreneurship: Anything can be a business.

True, this is a bit of stretch if you’re a stickler, but it’s true in principle. We’ve all heard of the guy who could sell bags of poo for $1 each, by discussing the benefits for plant growth.

The rule is more of a general principle of outlook – “more like guidelines” as Jack says of the Pirate Code. It’s about how you approach problems and what eyes you see with.

As a writer, my maxim has been “anything can be a story”. It’s about seeing the story qualities of things around you on a consistent basis. Lately, what I’ve been seeing – in the shower, when driving, when I first wake up, throughout a good day, are business ideas. They’re under every rock. The world is teeming with them.

And it’s scary, like a world filled with friendly but wild monsters. If writing was ever scary – the prospect of facing up to the work of writing a story, then founding businesses is sheer terror. But there’s a thrill in the terror.

Personally, I’m reaching a critical mass, of where I’m willing to step out on the ledge of risk of disaster, and attempt feats of brilliant energy. I’m more scared than I’ve ever been of storywriting, and that’s pretty scary.

But in fact, this is the path to get to there. The ledge of entrepreneurship is the tightrope of acrobatics, and the goal is the open free fall of having enough time, with my intellect still intact, and my spirit unbroken, my white hot fundamental energy unspent, to write.

Other people want to tour Europe with their gain. Some want to buy sprawling houses. I just want to be left alone in a decent place with enough leisure time to write. And it’s worth the risk. It’s worth the risk of being wrong, of failure (and getting up again, despite everyone thinking there’s proof you can’t do it. It’s worth the risk of having to start over. It’s certainly worth the risk of losing what I have.

The thing is, then, to see businesses everywhere, where they don’t exist. To see nascent businesses, and to be prepared to risk, to experience fear and trembling, to give some of them shape and form. In that sense, it’s not unlike writing a story. Anything can be a story. Anything can be a business.