Anytime you encounter a new experience there are 4 main emotions that come with that new experience. Learning about and understanding what you are feeling and why you are feeling that way will help you make better decisions and prevent you from making bad decisions based solely on these emotions. The negative emotions often lead to failure before the new online business has been given a real chance to start succeeding. Below we will discuss the 4 main emotions you can expect to experience when starting an online business.



First Emotion Uninformed Optimism

You are excited about starting a new business and excited about all the freedom and benefits that will come from the success of your business. You love the idea of being able to work from home and replacing and exceeding your current income. Although you have just joined and don't fully understand all aspects of the business, you feel great that you are doing something that is going to positively change your life.

Second Emotion Informed Concern

You've started to learn more about the business and started doing a few things to promote it, but you still don't understand everything. Although you are trying to learn all you can the business concept is not fully "clicking" and at the same time you are getting overloaded with information. At this stage your feelings start to curve negative and you question if this can really work and if you are capable of doing it.

Third Emotion Checking Out or Sticking it Out

In this stage you feel completely overwhelmed. Your excitement has turned to doubt and you have been struck by paralysis of analysis. You feel like you could almost start to panic...you still have the dream of owning your own business, but you start doubting if this is something you can really do.

This is the stage where you either have to fight for what you really want or you take what feels like the easy way out and you quit. You have to remember, you only fail at this if you quit. If you quit, you might feel better for a short period of time which is normally followed by the guilt of quiting on your dreams. This is the stage where determination equals success and a lack of determination equals failure. Keep pushing forward...this does pass.

Fourth Emotion Informed Optimism

Congratulations! At this point you have charged through the other emotions and have made it here. You have separated yourself from the pack and now have a much better chance at success. You know more about the business you joined and are comfortable with the information you have learned. You have a positive attitude and know that you have the ability to succeed and are determined to do so. You have started developing a plan for success and although you are still learning, you have recovered some (if not all) of your excitement and are full of confidence.

Conclusion

The list of emotions above has different time spans for everyone. If you understand what you are feeling and why you are feeling it, you have a much better chance of getting past it. You shouldn't take starting a business lightly and neither should you lightly take quitting one. As a rule of thumb I recommend intending to actively learn and promote a business for at least 6 months before deciding that the business you joined is not going to work for you. This is obviously assuming that you are actively and consistently working on it.