Have Confidence!

When I was in kindergarten, I was deathly afraid of a tallblonde girl named Terrie. She had never done anything to make mefear her, yet I averted my eyes when she walked by, avoided her atplaytime and always ensured there were at least five peopleseparating us when we would line up outside the classroom. Then oneday, for some reason, I stopped avoiding her. I looked her in theeye, and I don't remember what my 4-year-old mouth said, but Imust have decided she wasn't so scary-and soon I wasswinging next to her on the playground, playing kickball with herand picking dandelions with her out in the grass. To this day Istill have pictures from my birthday parties with her sitting nextto me and smiling.

I think about that situation today and can easily relate it towhat many entrepreneurs must feel when taking those first fewstart-up steps. You probably look around and see at least a coupledozen "Terries" following you around all day long,threatening to knock the wind out of your sails. The fact is, someof them are scary-but some of them aren't. Some of themcan be mentors, advisors and even friends who can actually helpyou. Who knows? You might end up building a playgroundtogether.