When Does The ‘Hustle’ Phase End?

Today I came across one of those Instagram accounts that promises to change your life. This account was being run by a 20-year old claiming to be earning tens of thousands of dollars a day through drop-shipping or advertising or something obscure (because what said person actually did was never disclosed). One way or another, this person had cracked the magic formula of business and was selling this formula on the internet. Now the intelligent part of my brain knew this sounded dubious. If I had become a multi-millionaire in 2 years I’d have way more to show for it than one screenshot of my sales dashboard that I could easily have photoshopped. I could reason that something about this didn’t make sense logically,  but the more emotional part of my brain, that’s self-admittedly extremely hard on myself,  broke down into tears. I was suddenly plagued with self doubt and feeling that once again, I must be doing something wrong or not doing enough.

When I started AJALI, I didn’t intend for it to ever become a business. An illness made me look for well made, all-natural body products that I couldn’t seem to find anywhere.  And when I found out other people were interested in what I was making for myself, a very small lightbulb went off in my head. And armed with my Masters in Business Management, I felt confident that I could make a mountain out of this small lightbulb of mine.  I worked my hands to the bone making every single product myself, branding them myself, lugging them to exhibitions myself, selling them myself etc. It was only after running AJALI for 2 years that I was able to match the (crappy) salary I was being paid by my  job so I quit my job and focused on running AJALI full-time.

I have learned so much since starting AJALI five years ago and I finally feel like I’ve reached a stable place with AJALI. A place where AJALI as a brand is well-known, respected and trusted by customers all over the world.  A place where we’re not moving every year or hiring new staff every month. A place where I’m confident in my leadership abilities and am blessed with competent staff. A place where I have vendors that I know and trust and a supply chain system that runs smoothly. A place where I can finally focus on what the larger vision and plan for AJALI is because the everyday stresses are “taken care of”. But should it really take five whole years to reach this point of stability? And when does the tens of thousands of dollars a day turnover kick in?

Of course there are unique idiosyncrasies that come with running a business in Nigeria that makes comparing myself to anyone based outside of this country a waste of time. Still that doesn’t change the fact that over 90% of business fail. So if you’re still able to keep your head above water (even if that’s barely the case) that’s something to celebrate massively.

In today’s world of putting your best foot forward online, it’s no wonder the niche of the “business experts” has plagued social media. It’s important to not get caught up comparing yourself to other people but instead, focus on your own journey and trust the process that if you put it the work, you’ll eventually reap the benefits.

Am I the only person that’s tired of wondering when the “hustle” phase of life ends?