{"id":15680,"date":"2018-09-07T13:14:46","date_gmt":"2018-09-07T20:14:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/?p=15680"},"modified":"2018-10-18T15:52:33","modified_gmt":"2018-10-18T22:52:33","slug":"founders-comfort-with-uncomfort","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/founders-comfort-with-uncomfort\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Ways Founders Can be Comfortably Uncomfortable"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jarie\u00a0Bolander has been a member of Founders Network<\/span><\/a> since May 2017. He\u2019s also been a prominent FN member in our San Francisco Chapter<\/span><\/a>. To receive peer mentorship from Jarie and over 600 fellow Tech Founders, please\u00a0request an invite<\/span><\/a> and join our global network.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cHello everyone. My name is Jarie Bolander and I\u2019m the co-founder and COO of Lab Sensor Solutions.\u201d The lights were glaring in my eyes as I began my 2-minute investor pitch in front of a thousand people. \u201cWe track the temperature and location of medical supplies so that they don\u2019t spoil.\u201d Whew. Glad I did not screw that up. All these lights and people are distracting, and I\u2019m uncomfortably hot considering I\u2019m in a lab coat.<\/p>\n

I have never been uncomfortable in front of crowds but this was different. It was demo day for 500 Startups, Batch 14, and it was a big deal. There were hundreds of investors in the audience and hopefully one of them would like what I had to say.<\/strong> That made the pressure to perform in the uncomfortable, even awkward, situation even more important.<\/p>\n

Pitching your startup is just one of many uncomfortable situations that founders routinely find themselves in.<\/strong> If you have never found yourself uncomfortable in a situation, then I\u2019d venture a guess you\u2019re not pushing hard enough.<\/p>\n

\n

“Pitching your startup is just one of many uncomfortable situations that founders routinely find themselves in.” @TheDailyMBA<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nThe World is Uncomfortable, Especially for Founders<\/h2>\n

Founders are a unique breed of person. Who else would have the audacity to believe that whatever newfangled idea they are working on will change the world? In most cases, that newfangled idea won\u2019t even make it to market. In order to figure that out, a founder needs to push out of their comfort zone.<\/p>\n

On my journey as a founder, I constantly work on being comfortable with being uncomfortable as a way to challenge myself to jump into the deep end of uncertainty<\/strong>. This is where I have found the most opportunity and inspiration. Here are the three ways that work for me:<\/p>\n

\n#1 Stay Healthy<\/h2>\n

\nPoor health and fatigue exacerbate how you experience stress and anxiety. It\u2019s a vicious cycle that is hard to break. Throw in an uncomfortable situation, which raises stress and anxiety, and you\u2019ll soon feel the influences of poor health. I prioritize getting good sleep, exercising, and staying hydrated. Each of those things makes it a lot easier to handle stress and anxiety as well as keeping your mind sharp.<\/p>\n

Note – Staying emotionally healthy is just as important and it may be worth working with a coach<\/a> during high-stress periods.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\n#2 Practice Your Craft<\/h2>\n

\nI practiced<\/a> my Demo day pitch<\/a> for three months so that when the time came, it would seem effortless. Those countless hours of practice conditioned me to know my material without thinking. This is similar to how an athlete prepares for a game — they practice their craft until it becomes automatic. I can\u2019t name a professional athlete who just \u201cwings it\u201d in competition. As a founder, neither should you.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n#3 Pay Attention to Trends<\/h2>\n

\nAs founders, we have invested a significant amount of time, talent, and treasure in our ideas. I\u2019d say the majority of my most uncomfortable situations have been when an investor or potential partner full on trashes my idea – \u201cI don\u2019t get it. You\u2019ll get crushed by some big company.\u201d The list goes on and on.<\/p>\n

The thing I have tried to do (sometimes in vain), is ignore the one-offs and focus on the collective wisdom of what I am hearing. A lot of times those trends tell more truth than any single comment. If you do this, then all those one-on-one comments lose their power and you can focus on data gathering instead of reacting.<\/p>\n

\nGo Get Uncomfortable and Enjoy It<\/h2>\n

Our job as founders is to build things that have never existed before. That mandate makes our lives more uncomfortable than most. By being comfortable with being uncomfortable, we can push past the critics, stand up for our ideas, and hopefully, change the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jarie\u00a0Bolander has been a member of Founders Network since May 2017. He\u2019s also been a prominent FN member in our San Francisco Chapter. To receive peer mentorship from Jarie and … <\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":16095,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7171,144],"tags":[18,21,90],"table_tags":[],"class_list":["post-15680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-startup-investing-and-funding","category-tech-startup-advice","tag-mentorship","tag-san-francisco","tag-tech-founders"],"acf":[],"featured_image_data":{"src":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Screen-Shot-2017-12-14-at-3.49.27-PM.png","alt":"Screen Shot 2017-12-14 at 3.49.27 PM","caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15680"},{"taxonomy":"table_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundersnetwork.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/table_tags?post=15680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}