In speaking with some in our industry, there seems to be a recurring thought-provoking concern or sentiment.

“I am afraid if I close my business people will look at me like I am a failure.”

Looking Past the Obvious

The knee jerk reaction response to  that would be “Who cares?”, “What other people think of you is not your business”, or “Don’t worry about what other people think”.

While all that is true, it matters to you.  You put a lot of heart and soul into what you do.  Most creatives leave a little bit of themselves in everything that they create so it seems so personal to leave it behind or let it go. However, you can’t let it hinder your future happiness. 

For whatever reason that you have decided to leave your business behind, the one thing that is certain is that it no longer serves your needs.  Your business could be financially successful but unfulfilling personally or it does not fit with your family’s current situation.  It could be that you have changed your mind about what success looks like or how you want to spend your time. 

It could be that you are a multi-potentialite, a term coined by Emily Wapnick in this TED talk .  A good portion of our society tells us that we need to pick something and devote our whole life to it so that we can be the best something that we can be. Multi-potentialites are interested in more than one thing and some go after all their interests at the same time and some string it together in a linear form, one after the other.  There is an above-average amount of Multi-potentialites in this edible art/baking universe.  This was not the first career choice for so many and so many leave to go on to the next thing.  And none of it had to do with failure but as a shift in interest or passion.

Regardless why you have made the choice to move on, do so with your head held high.

Feeling Confident

The great thing about success is that you get to define what it means for you.  If you are not sure exactly what that is yet, you can borrow these words from Maya Angelou as a jumping-off point: “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.” 

You can choose to worry about everyone else’s opinion while moving forward or you can ignore them all.  You can also choose to leave in a manner that will make you more confident.

If it makes you feel better, give a brief explanation as to why you are moving on.  Or announce your next move and gather support from the people you respected from the beginning. Social media now gives us the opportunity to accomplish that.

As you go forth, leave knowing that all the success and the lessons you learned in this endeavor will follow you to the next.  Looking back someday you will be able to see that you never really leave anything behind, we just use it as building blocks for the future.