How Do You Deal with "Entrepreneurial Terror"?

Berto

Berto

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Jan 3, 2009
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So last night, I slept like dog shit, fretting over some technical glitch that I thought of during my sleep. I was half awake / half asleep and unable to solve it in that mental state.

Finally got up at 4am, got to work, and couldn't remember what I was even worried about.

5 hours later, I just stumbled over the problem and solved it in 45 seconds. WTF. A shitty night of sleep for pretty much no reason.

This lack of sleep and overall anxiety over some business issue is sometimes known as the Entrepreneurial Terror. Do you ever get it? How do you handle it?

I am usually fine, but technical stuff gets me the most often. A pen and paper and forcing myself to wake up and relax would have probably done the trick here.
 


While I often found out it difficult to fell sleep because I am thinking of different business plans and ideas in overall. I probably should leave a paper and pen(like you mentioned) near so if worthy idea comes into my mind, it would be good to write it down. Productive, isn't it? :D

By the way, there are talks that Mendeleev dreamed his table. :)
 
I solve this stuff by writing it down. Unless my sites have completely fallen apart I just write it down and go to bed. I find that the act of writing it on a piece of paper labeled "TODO" lets my brain relax and not sweat it until the next day.

Also doubles as a todo list. ;)
 
Go back to sleep, knowing if it's an actual problem, I'll have several e-mails about it from various people when I wake up. :)
 
Always keep a pad and pen near your bed side. Half the time you won't be able to read the sleep written notes but writing it down will commit it to memory and eliminate the burden of tryin to rember
 
If you have been jamming all day and your brain is wacked out then just step away and do something none business related.

I just take a walk and have my cell with me to record any solutions. I have 100% success rate so far. :)

Jonny
 
dmnEPC said:
Always keep a pad and pen near your bed side. Half the time you won't be able to read the sleep written notes but writing it down will commit it to memory and eliminate the burden of tryin to rember
Click to expand...

Same concept here, just with the phone, recording audio notes with the evernote app.

Added bonus: it's fun to hear your half-asleep audio mumble when you listen to it the next day :)
 
you also need to consider the possibility that the sleepless night helped in the fast solution you had afterwards, it might be that the major part of the processing of the issue took place at night.
Or you just struggled with it and when you let it go for a couple of hours the simple solution materialized.
 
I get shitty sleep because I just think about business stuff, I find having a pen and paper next to my bed stops any anxiety, that way you'll never lose those thoughts, but sometimes you wake up and look at the paper and think "what the fuck was I thinking".
 
I'll have something on my mind before bed, and it will manifest itself into a horrible nightmarish incarnation of it self--my mind usually interprets some small issue like a bug fix as a massive beast chasing me through the woods...

I wake up in a cold sweat, only to immediately forget what it was once my girlish screams subside.

Much Like the OP, it will come across in the next few days as a simple fix.

So yes, I do get it, and I suppose I handle it the way most would. crying under a table, sucking my thumb with a blanky.


For real though, work bleeding into your dreams sucks
 
cheshire said:
I solve this stuff by writing it down. Unless my sites have completely fallen apart I just write it down and go to bed. I find that the act of writing it on a piece of paper labeled "TODO" lets my brain relax and not sweat it until the next day.

Also doubles as a todo list. ;)
Click to expand...

^^This

Sometimes I'll get up and start or finish the part that is really bothering me and it lets me relax so i can go to sleep.
 
Does anyone ever get "business dreams" when they sleep?

I had a dream a week ago that I lost all my merchant accounts at once and couldn't accept orders to my website.

I've also had dreams in the past where everything was glitching up and there was just a massive amount of errors scrolling on my computer screen.

I know I am not the only one here who has dreams like this!
 
Used to have it a lot. Still do every once in a while and not just work related, but a few additional things life related. I get up, write all the thoughts down on a piece of paper, drink some beer, turn on favorite songs, lurk wf, reddit, some .ru sites, drink more beer and go back to sleep.
 
bluechinagroup said:
Does anyone ever get "business dreams" when they sleep?

I had a dream a week ago that I lost all my merchant accounts at once and couldn't accept orders to my website.

I've also had dreams in the past where everything was glitching up and there was just a massive amount of errors scrolling on my computer screen.

I know I am not the only one here who has dreams like this!
Click to expand...

Yeah used to happen to me all the time. But was in that 'half asleep half awake' state, but more asleep than awake lol. I got over it by making sure there's a 30m - 1hr gap between finishing work and going to sleep. Reading a not-too-intense book, browsing FB/Twitter, reading bullshit blogs etc. Did the trick
 
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Good suggestions above, thanks guys.

I dream in PHP when I'm in coding mode. This last one was about RDBMS normalization. Yikes.

But no business dreams. I'm really not much of a business man. I just like me my technology and niche.
 
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