Starting a business is exciting and ambiguous – and that’s the fun. It’s a time of possibility, experimentation, imagination, and showing the world what you can do. But, it can also feel slow, frustrating, and full of traps and distractions, leaving potential entrepreneurs to question their self-worth and to wonder why they started in the first place. As a small business coach, I’ll help you cultivate an entrepreneur’s mindset, so you can start and grow your businesses with confidence and step boldly into the role of business owner. Subscribe to get access to weekly tips, small business interviews, and more.
💘 Let’s Talk About Love
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Happy early Valentine’s Day. Let’s talk about love – specifically, being too in love with your own ideas, perspective, or worldview. I recently finished a massive project. Honestly, it was a real success. The data is stronger, leaders are changing behavior, stakeholders are genuinely happy with the outcome, and… …this was probably my fifth or sixth attempt at doing almost this exact project. Earlier runs at the same problem fizzled out. We struggled to generate buy-in. We missed key stakeholders. We drew sharp lines between the ideas that “mattered” and the ones that didn’t, between the vision we cared about and the people we felt were standing in the way. We loved our vision and tried to protect it from people who “didn’t understand it.” This time looked very different. We listened more. We worked with the system instead of against it. We spent time understanding how decisions actually got made, not how we wished they were made. We treated the process itself as something to respect – even when it was slow or frustrating. In the past, we were deeply attached to the outcome and openly resentful of the process. This time, we cared about the outcome – but we weren’t in love with it. We were more objective, less defensive, more curious. And that distance made the work stronger. We stopped trying to force the world to match our worldview and started trying to understand the world we were actually operating in. Valentine’s Day is a fitting reminder: empathy can fuel your work and your life – loving your ideas too much often gets in the way. When we love something, our brains prioritize it, narrowing our attention and motivating us to protect it. Over time that protection turns into attachment. We can be “in love” with our own ideas, solutions, and answers – and the tighter we grip, the harder it is to see things clearly. Empathy calls for a different stance. It invites us to step into someone else’s perspective – not to agree with it, but to understand it. Practicing empathy means listening like a researcher. You suspend judgment, loosen your grip on your ideas, and focus on understanding how someone else experiences the situation. You intentionally expose yourself to new information, constraints, motivations, context, and tradeoffs you can’t see from your own seat. Relationships – between customers, partners, stakeholders, neighbors, members of different political parties, even nations – break when we assume we already know the other person and hold our views so tightly that we stop listening. Instead of defending the story we’re in love with, we need to shift to curiosity. This isn’t easy. It takes effort. Empathy is slower. It requires pausing, listening, tolerating discomfort, and holding tension. But it’s also what allows you to see clearly enough to make better decisions – and eventually achieve better outcomes for everyone. Empathy isn’t about abandoning your perspective. It’s about loosening your grip on it long enough to understand someone else’s. Until next time, Michael
Michael Schefman | 321 Liftoff Copyright © 2026 by 321 Liftoff LLC |
Michel Schefman, 321 Liftoff
Starting a business is exciting and ambiguous – and that’s the fun. It’s a time of possibility, experimentation, imagination, and showing the world what you can do. But, it can also feel slow, frustrating, and full of traps and distractions, leaving potential entrepreneurs to question their self-worth and to wonder why they started in the first place. As a small business coach, I’ll help you cultivate an entrepreneur’s mindset, so you can start and grow your businesses with confidence and step boldly into the role of business owner. Subscribe to get access to weekly tips, small business interviews, and more.
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